Is this summer is this

The time of our lives that we frolic

That we run rampantly through the streets

That we judge another by the sweat on their skin

Than the quality of their love-making

Is this summer the time that we die

The time that we sing in couplets

To mourn the loss of our shells

And cast aspersions at our own good standing

And breathe a sigh of relief as the world sees us tremble

Sees us crumble under the weight of its own fanaticism and depravity

We’re drug seeking deviants

We care not for your pity, your weak and weary

We care for our own behalf, our own weakness

Our own weakness we wish to cover with trivial conceits

We give to those deserving, we seek wanton desire of war

And sex

We seek the fight and we seek the unforgiving sky

We seek the drop, when all flights of fancy melt

Into a damp chocolate, grainy and saccharine

Like sex

From our pantheon in the heavens we watch

We watch and we fuck, we drink and make merry

We proceed as the gods have proceeded before us

We spit from our Olympus, to the earth

Trying to wash away the crudeness of peace

The dullness of temperance

And the profligate sequestering

Of sex

And of course, I thoroughly enjoy criticism, both the good and bad.

Somebody kicked the door, the sound jarring Davis from the terrified coming to terms with the reality of the situation and evidently setting off the monster as well. It roared back to life from its otherwise slumbering state, probably as annoyed as Davis was by the sound. This annoyance, this shift of thought brought other ideas to mind, namely: if this monster was so big and bad why was it confined in this place? It could easily fly out on whatever it uses to fly, it could be out terrorizing schoolyards across Kentucky, yet it wasn’t. The realization hit as another kick series of kicks to the door, this thing was a boogey monster, something that inhabits dark spaces in the fears of children, naturally it’d be nocturnal and, assuming the fears of a child follow some sort of rational basis, naturally light must have some effect on it.

He wasn’t quite willing to try that second theory out, mainly because the only source of natural light in here was from the windows above, and they were only enough to create some ambient lighting. With ambient lighting seeming to do nothing to it he figured a mighty blast of light from, say, a flashlight would be along the lines of a playful punch to its side and a chiding of “Here I am, come eat me”. But the nocturnal bit helped as it gave him further hope that his sneaking past it should be slightly more doable. Not really less suicidal of a plan, but it raised the chances of survival so that the rational part of his mind, the part not drowned in fear and morbid interest, told him that the idea just might work. The alarm would still sound, there was no doubting that, but he’d be out in the open, plenty of direction to run.

That survival instinct kicked in as well, that selfish desire to maintain one’s safety above the safety of others. The dark thought of it going after his surprised co-workers surfaced, accenting his plan with animalistic opportunity. He was younger; he had the foreknowledge that this wasn’t any mountain lion, that this was one hundred percent mythic; he would be in his car by the time this thing ventured out and it’d be guts deep in someone’s torso as he drove down the interstate. At least, that’s what his mind was telling him to do, and again under the provision that this thing wasn’t allergic to light, that it just avoided it. The thought of him running out the door, alarm ringing, it chasing him through the toxic murk into the staff area (hell, it might just be too big to even get in there) and out the door. Its rear claws or talons or whatever using their breaking functions as it tries to stop its momentum from bringing it out into the sunshine but it’s too late, it is dust or charred skeleton or…whatever.

There was another loud kick to the door, Davis didn’t mind it and apparently neither did the monster. It gave another growl in the kick’s direction, but it was more akin to someone cursing the 4am garbage truck than a growl of rage. Hey, I’m trying to sleep here! Best instance or worst instance, he could feel his heart rate start to climb as the thoughts started to take shape in the memory of his muscles. The act of consciously thinking about walking as opposed to letting natural function take precedence was like learning all over again. He’d have to make sure each step didn’t fall on something noisy; he still had to avoid the poison-laden puddles as well. Standing up on the platform he made his way to the side with the ladder, the side facing the staff room with the conveniently open room.

Walking with light steps his legs felt heavier than he’d like. He wished he had remembered how he made his way down from that steel perch above him, how he’d climbed over metal and wooden boxes without making enough sound to bother the beast. Was it too enrapt with its bedtime meal than to notice something climbing down, or did it simply not care that he was there? David fought the urge to fall back into the stupor of thought, another loud bang against the wall helping him focus on the present. Peering over the edge and holding onto the railing, leaning slightly on his arms he saw a clean path to the staff room, the earth was wet with chemicals but a ruined pair of shoes would be the least of his worries. He turned his back and focused on keeping the tremors of fear from overtaking him. Up here he had the façade of safety; down there, soon to be down here, all bets were off.

His focused state of mind worked his nerves again; the fear hit a sort of auto-pilot, the fight-or-flight giving him the poise-and-agility he needed. While in his mind the variety of ways the beast would eat him played reel after reel grisly death scenes, his body was displaying its preternatural sneak system, those other baser instincts that came from stalking prey. Davis didn’t notice his feet sinking into the mud or how his muscles adjusted to the slightly shifting sludge, his mind was on the thing he needed to avoid waking. When the lighting shifted, when he could no longer see what was ahead of him due to the darkness of the unlit staff room did he realize what he had accomplished.

Other than the darkness up ahead, he first noticed his feet were burning. Not on fire, but the cold tingling sensation that comes from chemicals— not meant for dermal contact— coming into contact with the layers of skin on the bottom of his feet. They didn’t have many chemicals that could cause enough harm through being on the skin; those sorts of things require expensive polymer suits of special makes and quality. While this wasn’t kiddy stuff (you don’t want to bathe in it) you’re going to get some discomfort, some blisters if the concentration is strong enough, your basic low-grade chemical burn. Your lungs? Well if some of that unpleasantness made it to your lungs then you had issues. Your skin, while seemingly delicate, has adapted to having all sorts of things being poured on it. When these chemicals reach your lungs, even in low concentrations, you’re looking at edema; you’re looking at something seemingly so petty as breathing in some fumes turning into a glance in death’s general vicinity.

The heavy feeling in his legs returned, he had full control of them and he hated it. Grabbing the doorjamb for support he swung around the other side of the wall into the darkness; inside, only the light jutting from the rooftop window ambience. His eyes adjusting, he could see the room in faint grey outlines, relieved that the room was seemingly intact. Either the monster couldn’t fit in through the door or the room had little importance to it. The expected red glow from the exit sign was gone and the stupid realization hit him that he had his phone with him, as if he were carrying some sort of bomb set to explode the instant someone attempted to call him; then the sinking feeling that they should have called him, why hadn’t they tried to call him?

Intuition struck again as the typical electronics in the break room: the ruddy clock on the microwave, the hum of the refrigerator, the red glow of the exit sign, those familiar illuminations from when he would be the first to come in and turn on the lights, those were all not working. Reaching for the phone in his front pocket he half expected it to ring the instant he brought it out of the dampening veil of his grey denim, but as he predicted his phone was quite dead, or as dead as he’d risk experimenting with. Coupling these with the fact that the chemical monitoring devices weren’t working, in spite of the tenderizing experience of the toxic mud, made him realize that perhaps the beast had an effect on electronics. Which made sense, it lived in the dark, and it should have some imagined defenses such as the ability to remain in the dark. The kid that dreamed this thing was pretty clever, Davis reasoned, pretty smart but pretty dead.

Grabbling his way across the wall, groping along the chipped white paint that covered their refuge from work, his refuge from some horror, he made his way to the exit, his eyes adjusted to the twilight darkness of the room. Resting his palms across the bar that held him from his freedom, his heart raced as he imagined the freedom from his hell of a morning shift. Confident in whichever spells or fields or the litany of other unexplainable things that killed electronics, confident that it would stop the monster from bounding after him after tearing the door frame from the wall between them at the wailing sound of the alarm, confident that the door itself was real and not just some painted on novelty, confident in all of that he pushed.

The weight on the bar it was light, still well oiled in spite of its non-use. There was a slight squeak, but it was only as intense to cause his heart to leap in his chest, afraid not of the noise but that it would be the start of another, larger sound. But as he guessed, the alarm didn’t go off. He felt the gravel behind the door give way to the sweeping motion of the exit moving over it, a soft hushed hold metered by his footsteps coming down onto the ground and into the light. Not risking anything he opened it as far enough so that his body could slide through. In a slither he was on the other side and could feel the suns rays beat down on him in all their clichéd glory.

Furtively closing behind him he rested his back on the exterior wall and sank to the ground. Through the fogging plastic of the gas mask he saw his feet shoes discolored by the chemicals and only thought how his feet would look. The light itself was taking some getting used to, combined with the closeness of the mask and the post-adrenal rush the nausea massaged his chest like a python wrapping itself around his upper digestives. He pulled his mask off seconds before he felt his mouth water, twice those seconds before he was dry heaving on the side of the building. He felt somewhat thankful that he was late; he was going to catch a short breakfast during a break. His mind then raced to the half eaten bodies starting to enter decay and he retched even harder, his stomach muscles pulling overtime. By the time he was finished he could hear a car pull up on the other side of the building. Maddy was here.

Here goes.

Marcus stood in front of the doors of Mr. Ares’ office for quite some time. While not quite long enough to elicit the utmost attention of the security guards wandering the complex, but long enough for the secretary past the glass doors to motion him inside. It’s not like she hadn’t seen it before, the wary standing outside ‘neath the verandah; some were contemplating the fleeting fascination of the wager, others were holding off the inevitable walk on through the doors toward promises of victory and the ever present thought of ruin. Marcus was here with purpose, his wistful daydreams of power were to become reality today.

“Pleased to meet you, have a seat. I’ll alert Mr. Ares that he has a client.” Standard secretary speak, curt and congenial. Her voice was as satin smooth as her name placard suggested, Velveteen. He did as he was told, he had a seat and she followed through with her promise. Some low voice emanated a response, too low for anyone but the receptionist to get the specifics but the tone and length suggested something along the lines of “I’ll be with him shortly”. Marcus busied himself with a magazine from a small coffee table. Things were going hunky-dory in Middle-East and the president was facing a minor scandal, of course this was a year back so that prescient sort of irony took the forefront of Marcus’s mind but he leafed through it as interestedly as he could, reading up on some minor innovations that never really found their footing in the annum following. Marcus sank into the hold of the almost-comfortable armchair, anxiousness depositing into the hard rock of determination in the pit of his stomach; still just as heavy, not nearly as consuming.

From his throne Marcus felt the whoosh of air followed by a light tapping on the wooden door that separated the waiting area from Ares’ inner-office sanctum. Marcus looked up from his magazine and saw a man, mid-thirties and Mediterranean features. “Come on in and have a seat. Let’s see what you have to say.”

The inside of the office wasn’t anything particularly special, your basic television-lawyer setup. Bookcases for show, file-cabinets for function, everything was there to browbeat you into giving your best offer. Marcus felt himself flush, almost erotically; he’d heard it secondhand and figured this must be the god-glow, the aura of power and virility that surrounded every supreme. If anything, this only steadied his thoughts as he prepared to lay his case out before the veritable god of war.

In his pocket Marcus had a folded piece of paper, it evolved rapidly from the scrawled piece of parchment his 16 year old self wrote condemning the unjust society that so often plagues adolescence to its current state. Typed neatly on acid-free paper and in utilitarian font Marcus listed, bullet-point style, his plan along with the self-imposed rules and standards he set against himself. Nothing should be simple; progress should be from the strength of the human spirit through adversity. Fully aware of the hypocrisy resonating between his personal credo and his current actions, he relied on the old gamblers’ chestnut: Risk big win big.

Mr. Ares took the piece of paper and with a gentle flick the 92 bright thickened to a parchment, the light creases evening out. The words so neatly typed lay tendrils across the page, weaving an intricate calligraphy through one another, seemingly undecipherable in their beauty but wholly legible. Further text bled through nothingness and onto the page; the details of the contract from the god’s side of things. Ares smirked at his own doing, but even more so at what this mortal wanted. Too often it was servants of world leaders, mercenaries and other men of ill conceit who brought contracts wrought by lawyers of the greatest means. Too often did his touch set these contracts ablaze and he stare see these would be warriors out of his office. But here, a mortal of the humblest quality, is a man who wagers his soul for his dreams, an ephemeron of bloodied spirit willing to bring war against a nation for no other reason than to bring others spectacle and meaning. Ares signed.

The godglow was overcame by a much different sensation, a buzzing as if throughout his blood wrought his body as he momentarily lost consciousness. In his downed state of mind he could see nothing but light, an other-worldly aura that shone through all his thoughts. When he awoke Velveteen was applying a cool salve to his head, scented of lavender and something caught in the periphery of all smells he’d ever witnessed. Finally gathered of his senses, Marcus attempted to raise himself up, with the Ares’ hand there for support. At last on his feet, he was greeted with a firm yet friendly handshake as Ares spoke. “It’s been fantastic doing business with you. Barring anything drastic, I shall be seeing you in seven years. Don’t make me regret this.” Ares knew he wouldn’t bemoan this boon, in seven years the mortal realm would be free to move on its own accord, free from the yoke of his kind…should things work in his favor. “’Vette, can you see this man out?”

Velveteen had been resting against the far wall, having already put whatever she had out away. She walked as daintily has she had dabbed Marcus’s head. Still weak on his feet, the secretary helped him walk out of the office, the doors opening in front of him and closing behind him on their own accord. Setting him down gingerly on the sofa next to the exit, ‘Vette rushed behind her desk and mixed together a quick draught to settle the energy currently coursing through the oath-maker’s body. In and instant she was back at his side, handing him, again gingerly, a Dixie cup containing a pungent-smelling yet otherwise clear liquid. Her caution in giving him the container was well needed as the instant it entered his hands he felt the cold warmth of power swirling throughout it, as if he were to drop the cup there would be an explosion. ‘Vette stated briefly “Drink” and that he did. Instead of the predicted removal of his lower face from his body form the expected blast, it went down smooth like a liquid antacid, complete with the chalky aftertaste.

The coolness of it was immediate, as was the instantaneous rejuvenation. Velveteen simply smiled and went back to her desk. He’d done it, Marcus had finally made the pact and the realization that he now had to fulfill it struck him. He’d dreamt of this moment for years past, and now here it is and he has no clue where to start. Standing up gently, he walked out of the building, the electricity of emotion building in his fingertips as he reached out his hands to the cars around him.

Marcus could feel the pulse of the air around him, each individual element in his ken, each doing his bidding. With a tensing of his fingers he oxygenated the fuel in each of the 8 cars in the lot. Chirping loudly with his lips they exploded in a deafening boom, each of suites’ windows in the lot shattered, save for the god of wars’. Another whistle and the fires died out immediately, the cars rebuilt themselves, shrapnel flying back to their spots, slicing back through the air to their respective vehicle. Smirking he made his way to the bus stop and started his journey.

èèè

Clever kids made it far in life; clever kids got jobs after college and made something of their lives. Clever kids got wives and mortgages, children they don’t beat and secretaries they sleep with. Clever kids were clichéd, trite, petty and oh so politically correct; clever kids were boring. Davis was not clever. Davis was not clever but he saw things for how they were. He could divine his way past the bullshit and see the words meant, barbs and all. It didn’t get him far in life, it hardly does, but it made him happy. In the ten years since the kingdom had sprung up in the rockies and society went to shit, he’d been happy. Not that society went to terminal-level, end stage shit, just priorities changed and people weren’t quite alright with that. People started expressing their dreams, trying to make them reality, seeking out the gods or whatever they were for some sort of quick fix to all their woes. The king set this precedent, the king and his kingdom and it was the sort of thing Davis didn’t pay any mind to. Davis dealt with Davis problems and it was precisely a Davis problem that got him involved in this whole mess.

He’d slept in, he’d never done that before. Even when the power went out he’d still wake up with time to spare to make to the factory. Only 28 he was one of the younger guys there, not quite as much the modified burly get-the-job-done type, not yet, but muscular enough to catch the eyes of those into that sort of thing. Rough hands, but not overly calloused, rugged face years away from haggard, Davis was the ghost of Christmas past for the largely mid-to-late forty year olds that were his coworkers. Because of all these things it was much of a surprise to him, more the slacker type, to see his fellow employees standing outside the pale green double-doors instead of deftly working. His hair still in disarray and clothes wrinkled, despite his half-minute efforts to look personable as if anyone cared but you gotta at least attempt to look professional, he reasoned.

So here were these well-seasoned men, huddling in a frightened mass as he drove into the lot, frightened himself at getting a reprimand in spite of his otherwise good attendance. His ears shone a beacon into his hungover mind as the sound and feel of the sand beneath his hard-soled shoes ground agony throughout the bones of his joints and skull. By golly gee, from further inspection of the scene it looked to be a chemical spill of some sort, some dark liquid pooling beneath the bottom of the doors, locked with the same-old familiar array of padlocks he’d have to wrestle with every time he had to close or open-up shop. His surveillance, however, was interrupted by a low growl emanating within his locked playground, almost-human-almost-jungle-cat, and he understood the fear in the old men’s eyes.

“Cougar?” He called out. It wasn’t a common occurrence in these parts, but every now and then some wildcat would jimmy its way through some cracked window, loose siding or open cellar door and give someone a scare. No fatalities really, they’re more scared of us et cetera, worst that’s really happened was one of those big muscular kittens jumping a cleaning woman at the local elementary, drawn to the sound of the vacuum cleaner, giving her a mild heart attack and a few deep scratches on her back.

“Possibly,” the toweringest of the group replied, Owen. About forty-seven and six foot eight, he was the de facto ‘leader’ of the non-management types. “When we got here the doors wouldn’t open, hear all the growlin’ an’ such and decided to lock them from our side. Was about to call animal control when stuff started spilling out. Figured the thing’d knocked over some of the tanks. Hazardous materials should be here in an hour or so.” Davis nodded his head in assurance that he understood the situation, though suspicious of the lack of actual management types here.

“Where’s the others?” craning his head in the direction of the management trailer, Davis gave an annoyed expression on his face. While the workers got the distinct pleasure of working in the air-conditioning-less building, the management types got to relax in their cool little trailer after the attempted renovations on their previous workroom in the main arena of employment.

“Maddy’s home, her kid’s sick, Vick’s still in Chattanooga, freak-storm or what-have-you has got him stuck there after Saturday’s conference. We’re flapping in the breeze here until noon when Maddy checks in on us.” Not that this hasn’t happened before, the managementlessness not the cougar and the hazardous chemicals, but it was a rare occurrence that would require an audit (they were due for one anyway) afterward.

The liquid gathering underneath the door grew in a sudden swell coupled with a frantic growling and clawing at the door. This cat wanted out and was fighting the fumes. Funny thing though, it occurred to Davis, they couldn’t smell a thing other than wet earth. Nothing caustic wafted their way, none of the acrid smelling chemicals they used sparingly accosted their nasal cavities. In fact the chemical monitors weren’t even whirring their sirens that they whirred so incessantly if the chemical concentration reached a certain threshold in the air. Low incessant chirps and yellow for “evacuate slow and orderly”, high air-raid bellows and bright red for “you’re screwed”. There was none of that, even with power outage the batteries would have lasted days.

Leaving the crowd he made his way around the building. Everything was looking according-to-code and by-the-books. No vehicles parked too close, nothing leaning against the walls, clean paint and unbroken windows, nothing barred their boat-building fortress. It was practically perfect in every way, a hearty building built in the style of a barn, a multimillion one at that. Larger pieces roll in and out on a daily basis; they worked the intertwining wood and metal, painted them in expensive chemicals and sent them on their way. Savior boats were primarily commercial, they had a few private contracts but mainly for people who weren’t as rich enough to afford the elite professional type of boat that their better off neighbor could afford. Still they prided themselves in their workmanship and did their best damned job, not quite rivaling the luxury of your Saudi kings and neo-Czars, but enough for Joe Sixshooter and his marvelous six-pack to impress young women anywhere with enough water to float one of these things. Savior built tour boats, boats for fishing companies, mainly east-coast outfits and primarily through contract. While Savior didn’t pay their workers exorbitant amounts of money for their learned experience and the prevailing lung damage, it was enough to live somewhat comfortably in this small Kentucky town. It was a good enough looking factory; after all, it was the logo on the company card. Bright green barn-looking-thing with the stereotypical hills and large birch or larch or something towering above, except for the hills and rising sun behind it, all parts were a accurate facsimile of the truth. With the tree he found exactly how that damned cat got them, how some ferocious feline felicitously flung sabots into their heurs.

Running back to his car he grabbed a gas-mask and ran back to the tree, trying to see if he could find a way up that didn’t involve him falling to his death. Before he was ready to make his ascent the small voice in the back of his mind, ingenuity in the face of stupidity, cried out that there were ladders propped up behind the executive trailer. To the rest of the workers he looked like a madman running hither and thither with odds and ends. It all made sense in his mind as it was his only goal to make it up to the roof of their workplace and see exactly what was going on in there. The ladder reached about three-quarters of the way up the height of the building, he’d have to use the tree but he’d have an advantage on his way up. Resting it against what he felt to be the sturdiest angle he deftly made his way up the rungs and felt the firm grip of wood in his grasp as he raised himself from the ladder. He’d made it up to a branch that had access to the roof before the vertigo really set in. Through his hands and feet he could feel the small movements in the wind as the tree minutely swayed. No time to stop now, he grabbed a higher branch to keep him steady as his feet shuffled along the lower, most secure one. He felt the branches lurch down and backward and saw his perception tilt as the tree tried to seemingly shake him loose. His workboots had enough grip not to lose their footing as his head reeled from the lack of control he had and the closeness he came to tumbling 20 or so feel on his back; possibly fatal, most definitely disabling and in all likelihood not covered by workman’s compensation.

Feeling his weight in the pit of his stomach he adjusted his arms and hugged the top branch, changing his center of gravity to one not so precariously hung over nothingness. When his world righted itself he further trundled along until he saw the sheen of the roof not a few feel below him, rising to meet the branches where they ended. Eying this new stable ground he jumped off with a slight clatter, probably would have started the cat inside but from the position of the windows the animal would have to be a damned trapeze artist to make its way back up, else it would have and not be trapped to begin with. He approached the window with ease as he lifted the mask from around his neck and placed it on his face, fumes rise and settle regardless of their toxicity. Last thing he’d want would be to die from lung edema after getting a whiff from some corrosive chemical concoction mixed by this felinus chemistrus. From the looks of it this cat wasn’t your normal cat, not from what he could tell by the damage to the window. There didn’t seem to be any pre-existing damage before and last he checked there were no freak brick storms ravaging the countryside. Were it not so high up he’d have sworn a human had done this had they wished to cut open their fists. Something had, at the very least, as there was a smattering of blood on the lower edges as from what Davis guess had been where the cat slunk its way in onto a steel beam that ran along near the top of the ceiling of the building. From there it’d found a way down some crates or had used it muscular body to affect its impact to something slightly less jarring. Large cats are supposed to land feet-first too, right? From the blood on the edge of the broken window it appeared the cat had stuck itself pretty badly during its intrusion, the dried dark blood on the beam below seconded that notion as it shone in the morning sun. Also what shone in the morning sun, what he could catch in the corner of his vision was a button, a brass one that clung to a piece of blood-treated denim.

It made no sense; a cat couldn’t carry a person up here while climbing a tree. His mind shifted toward a darker place, at the thought of a child’s lifeless body in the maw of a mighty cougar as it ascended the tree he’d half-way climbed. No, not even that. He would have noticed the blood on the tree and on the ground if that were the case. It had to be something different. Perhaps the cat had worn a denim jacket? Maybe it was building a nest and was out searching for clothes? These thoughts weren’t leading anywhere and had only given rise to the thought of some monstrous flying cougar wearing some 80’s throwback jacket, snapping its fingers while fishing a loosie from its pocket. Oh, I be it thinks it’s so fucking cool.

This image in his mind, this imaginary lapse was interrupted by a larger, more menacing growl than he’d heard before as he looked down to see the cat fly. But not on wings, not by some imaginary force, it was flying as a baseball flies, thrown from the wrist of something that could throw one hell of a speedball. The cat hit the wall and bounced, landing a few feet below and a few feet away from the now-marked position of where the wall bunted it. Davis kept on watching as whatever it was made its way across the pools of chemicals that littered the ground. This…creature, whatever it was, lacked form. In his eyes it was nothing but a blur, a blur that left sizzling footprints through the chemical-laden mud. His mind screamed at him, not to get away but for understanding at what he was looking at. It drastically needed to know what this was; it was drawn to it out of curiosity. It didn’t feel like some sort of camouflage, it was like someone had smudged his eye and the only way to wipe that hindrance away would be to get closer. When he finally came to his senses he realized he no longer felt the sun at his back, he was sitting on the beam, inside the building and just below the broken window but too far below to make his way back up without a good jump and grabbing on to a broken pane of jagged glass. He was going to have to make his way down and to one of the exits, through this new lair of this speck-in-the-eye beast, this sight-siren that was now consuming the flesh of this mountain lion that could now be seen in a more sympathetic light. He watched as chunks of flesh disappeared from the corpse and into this annoying blur. He was terrified.

è

It was that infectious curiosity that drove him against his fear, to see that mirage of beast be turned to something either more understandable or a figment of imagination. He dropped down from his perch on to a wider beam below him, then again to an elevated platform where they stored mundane materials. He was still about 10 feet above the ground, from his position the clarity of the beast was the same as from up above, in fact it was ever more indiscernible. The way it bulged and swayed he could make out that it was fairly muscular; it lumbered so it must have a high body weight, and the way the sunlight caught wisps of its non-descript nature it appeared to have some sort of mane around what he believed to be its head.

The smell of rotting flesh—difficult to divine through the acrimonious odors from spilled toxins and their corresponding vapors—that is what drove him from his stupor; it had been nesting here since the weekend began. In the corner, on the ground opposite from him laid a heap of animal carcasses. More than that he could see exactly what he had passed off before, the bodies of what he thought to be several children wearing mangled clothes ripped by what he assumed to be either the razor sharp maw of this beast or the razor sharp claws it used. The logic in this, the simple fact that these children were brought here by the monster, that they didn’t simply wander in after a leisurely climb up a 30 foot—he’d later ask Maddy for the proper species of the plant—tree, this fact made him realize that he wasn’t as safe from the beast as he’d imagined.

The thought of flying mountain cats swooped into his mind again as he gave thought to this beast having wings, but the blurs weren’t right. Sure, it could have folded them in toward its body, but the way it carried itself, two legs not four, made him reassess the situation. This was something created by man and but not given form, this was the monster that lurked in closets of children and some god had put it upon itself to bring it into reality. Here he was, watching some kid’s boogeyman chow down on cat-food. If it weren’t for the fact that the child (and likely a friend of his or two) was probably one of the few corpses having the worst play date ever, he would have reveled in it. Instead he continued watching, wondering how the hell he was going to escape.

èè

When it comes to monsters, the mythic or the manmade, it always had to deal with the gods. Before the issues became public they were things of urban legend. Some well-intentioned human would ask an ill-thinking proprietor to bring such-and-so into being for some utterly doomed reason, the result was typically ironic—what with the hoisting and the petards and so on—in fashion but left some mythical creature out in the society, their masters’ soul being left in service of the god from which they sought their boon. These things weren’t public knowledge because the whole boon-granting business was the word of tightly pursed mouths, hush-hush skull-and-bones sort of talk. Another thing stopping the insanity of myth from encroaching into the world was that boons were granted with good reason, that is, rarely. Gods granted boons to increase their bearing on the world, they give you power so you can accomplish great things that make people believe further in their concepts. Anteros would help you win your lover’s heart; Hermes would help you pull off the heist of the century; and so forth.

Not that all feats of daring doom were under the influence of some sort of godly boon, just that they were so rare in occurrence that the gods needed a bit of a power boost now and then when they did whatever they did in their heavens. That nature of gods was shrouded in, well, myth. They didn’t abide by any sort of earthly law, when cornered they simply disappeared and they didn’t give interviews. From what the world could figure, or at least logically assume, from these beings were three things. First: they didn’t gain power from people believing in them, but actions belonging to their authority. Secondly: There were no demigods; the tales of god and man having offspring were, in all likelihood, the early recipients of boons. Lastly: the god-glow didn’t have a physical affect on the human body, at least not anything that was measurable by current standards, it was purely mental.

èè

He wasn’t sure how long he watched it, questioning its existence while trying to give it a form that wasn’t so ludicrous. This was a child-killing, cougar eating monstrosity pulled from the aether of a kid’s imagination, it was supposed to look horrifying no so… interesting. You see these pictures of serial killers and you’re disgusted with them, you know their crimes and you just feel ill. But no, here he was watching, taking mental notes on this aberrant creature like some sort of scientist that lives among the apes. Except he was no Jane Goodall, and this ape would likely eviscerate Davis as easily as it did those it had brought to its new domain hadn’t it been for, what he guessed, the fumes of the spilled containers killing its sense of smell.

After what felt like eons he heard a car pull up outside; must have been either animal control or Maddy checking up on them. If it were Maddy she’d wait there until animal control came around, if it were control then they’d open the doors to their quick demise. He could hear talking outside, more people, it was animal control and he doubted their all their tranquilizers and shock batons combined could take something like this down. They’d still need the keys, without those they wouldn’t be able to open up. When you have mass amounts of chemicals like this you lock up tight and keep a tight chain of custody on the keys to open up. The last thing you need is some meth head leaking a cloud of toxic fumes along the interstate, or some kids sneaking in and blowing it all to hell. He glanced back at the children’s bodies and the reality of it started to sink in, surpassing the wonderment by just a little bit.

But they’d seen him go up, didn’t they? They knew he was in here, he wasn’t reporting anything back from where he thought he’d be, atop the roof. While the doors didn’t automatically open from the inside there were keys to unlock them in the break room, should somebody accidentally get locked in. Of course there was the emergency exit out the break room as well, the though occurred to him, he’d been so enamored in watching this thing that he’d forgotten that he could easily escape…should he want to trek across the chemical laden mud, through the realm of the boogeyman. Not that it couldn’t get him up here either, but the idea of going down there seemed more terrifying than his relative safety up here just watching; though if he just stayed up here and let them open up with Maddy’s keys, well that situation would be sub-optimal as well and he couldn’t just yell out “Don’t come in, here there be monsters”, as if they’d be able to comprehend that sentence on the first try and hold back, knowing there was something sinister in here. He had to make for the fire exit, to save him and to save the others.

—

It seems like there always have to be words on the paper to get me to start writing. That blank page, the stark white, is as damning to me as  the question “what do you want to do?”. The answer is simple, everything. I want to write to my hearts content, I have a hundreds of stories intersecting in my mind, each new thought is a seed to be sown. However, it’s that lack of faith in my own abilities that scares me at every blank page. Words are a crutch, they provide context and history for what you’re writing. When they’re on their lonesome there’s that defenselessness about them, that they are in themselves alone. The more you write the stronger the words come, they build upon the prior words; they take strength from the lack of it prior. The same comes from action, what are we without our history? When we describe ourselves what do we think about? Our looks are cosmetic and can be changed at our leisure, but when it gets down to it we are nothing without our past. The past is what makes us, if we forget it then we are turtles lacking shells, our soft timid selves alone without any sort of purpose, we become kamikaze creatures of the moment, engines running dirty.

The past year had been tough, keeping that sense of self alive, trying to set myself apart from the teeming masses of prison. It’s easy to lose yourself in the violence, anger, redemption and religion. The people inside put on so many facets to their personality, some give in to their inner primal side while the others keep their well being aloft, buttressing it with how other perceive them. They might fool everyone else but they don’t fool me, the way how everything they say gives you that dull throbbing sensation in the back of your skull, that feeling telling you that these words are hollow pastel colored candies doled out because the prisoner hasn’t accepted the truth himself. They were changing. Rehabilitated or reformed, turned savage or broken, it doesn’t matter which. You go in thinking that there’s no way they can change you, there’s no way that they can turn you and you keep on thinking it all the while they’re doing it.

My crime was simple, political. It was all too common these days, you voice dissent and they fine you, do it some more and they throw you in prison. It was regardless of your affiliation, there were as many communists in here as there were anarchists, what mattered is that you spoke out of term. The moment you spoke your view on the way the government was trampling your rights or misrepresenting you, that very minute; you went from citizen to criminal. Some people in here were in the wrong place at the wrong time, others (myself included) were castigated after a lengthy fugitive period in which we became serial offenders. There was a time where speaking your mind about a political cause could get you in trouble, but in the clandestine “My PAC will break your legs” order. Where you were in the right to speak your mind and they were in the wrong for trying to squelch you with force. Those days are gone, I suppose, now it’s the law herself redacting your paragraphs and bleeping your movies. It wasn’t censorship, censorship was evil, it was protecting the populace from having to think, protecting the political process from the rude.

Close Quarters

The rumble of the rails had finally subsided into the lull of background, my drink had begun its slow course through my veins and the stranger in the next booth kept on staring at me. My wit whetted by scotch I begun our conversation with the obscene.

“Hello.” Possibly not as obscene as I had imagined and the tone was probably still friendly, but I think I got the point across.

“Hi there” his response tinged on the whimsical, as if I were some sort of friend or old acquaintance and he was about to spout some long litany of aphorisms regarding rail travel in my general direction. He had a long face, slightly graying hair and the same could be said about his eyes, he had those eyes you only hear of in tales involving the incredibly wise; however, I could tell it was a mixture of the setting sun and his (or mine) descent into public drunkenness. “it’s a pleasure to meet a fellow traveler” I took a quick glance around the room and saw that we were the last two people in the dining car; I could have sworn that there were others when I began my long first sip of drink, it was less unsettling as it was annoying. Here I was faced with the dilemma of making an enemy thirty minutes into a night light rail ride or be left with the ever so inebriated and their lengthy musings. I mulled it over with another sip and began a show of civility.

“Yes. Quite indeed” I half-decided, half-impulsed that being rude might be the middle ground that could work: he’ll feel awkward and I can sit here and drink some more while he bothers the other ‘fellow travelers’ in another car. Yet, he still hung around and the silence stuck to my skin like airborne honey. I shifted my gaze down to my backpack and pulled out a book to read, hoping that my apparent disinterest in striking up conversation and my overt interest to the things in my hands, decent alcohol and good literature, would be hint enough for him to skedaddle. Nonetheless he stayed nailed to his spot as if saying ‘challenge accepted’ in his own obnoxious way.

“Is that a good book? I’ve always wanted to read Walden but I’m always busy busy busy. The name’s Christopher, accountant, on my way back to see my family.” He was beaming in the most annoyingly iridescent way the entire time saying this, that infections hospitality that you can’t help but emulate. Dammit, he was winning. Acting my most genial I put down my book and gave out my hand.

“Vic, I’m a teacher, doing the same for Christmas. I’ve always wanted to travel the country by rail and since I’ve the time I figure: why not?” I tried not to sound so saccharine but to me it was evident how forced it was, every syllable was a grain of sugar over a cavity, I was surprised I didn’t wince. His handshake didn’t show any ill-understanding, to him he thought my words were sincere and it’s these illusions that we grant ourselves that give us faith in the rest of humanity, much more ‘fellow travelers’. A waitress bustled in asking us if we’d like anything else. I glanced down at my half-drank drink and grimaced at the thought that I had only two sips. I asked for a large glass of water. My fellow traveler declined anything; he ‘was just about to leave’. My eyes lit up and I downed the other half of my scotch in celebration.

____ ____ ____

It wasn’t the scream that woke me up but the rush of air from the stream of people as they made their way down the dining car. The lights in the room made the windows almost opaque from reflection. The same waitress who asked my order (and who had obviously filled it, I glanced up to see the glass of water almost finished) stopped by and asked me if I was alright. I responded with the standard ‘Yes-don’t-judge-me-I-fell-asleep-drunk’ but topped it off with a “What’s going on?” As the train was still moving we obviously weren’t at our stop.

“There’s been an incident” Not the best choice of words to allay the fears of the half-drunk and impinging on head-ached passenger. Had someone fainted? Break something? Was there a fight? Was there a bridge out over some clichéd canyon? As she steadied herself to continue on with her sentence that creeping fear clamored with the resurgence of the sound of the rails. As I thought it she said it ‘someone’s fucking dead’, albeit she said it with more grace and less expletives. She asked if I could join the rest of the passengers in the sitting car, for the sake of our safety and whatnot. The incessant sound of the train tracks was not helping my headache nor were the movements of the train conducive to walking in my semi-sober state, I made due with what I had and latched on to Theresa as we made our way down the car.

When we arrived I was surprised on how few people were actually with us. From my brief headcount there were only about 10 people. Theresa stood up before us all and made us aware of the situation. A certain passenger was found dead in his room, the train company was alerting the authorities but as we were 4 hours out from any rail station we were to remain in the car until further notice. I glanced around for my new friend Christopher, the accountant, surely he’d want to gossip and honestly, this would be something I wouldn’t mind gossiping about. Theresa, apparently the head train-stewardess or whatever they call themselves, came by and asked as she did before if I needed anything. I decided to switch it up, a glass of water and some Motrin; She gave a small smile and left as I deftly reclined my seat, closing my eyes against the low dim of the overhead personal lights. Except for there being a dead body on the train this ride wasn’t half bad; hell, the subdued atmosphere was most beneficial to some old fashioned relaxation. Theresa came back and I swallowed my pills and within five minutes I was fast asleep again.

____ ____ ____

Theresa woke me up about an hour into my nap, said there was something she needed to talk to me about. We left to another cabin; apparently the other passengers had left as well. Whatever it was that was keeping us in the sitting cabin was over. Back in the dining cabin she asked a question that made the night much more interesting.

“So you knew Mr. Argent. Christopher?” Well I had hardly known him, knew him? Past tense?

“Are you saying that he’s—“

“—dead, yes” I really didn’t know what to say on the matter. A man I had known for less than a few minutes was dead and I was, apparently, the only person to have had his acquaintance on this train. I didn’t feel responsible for his death, but since I was his only tie on this train I felt some sort of responsibility in dealing with the events following his death. Perhaps if I had approaching things differently the night could have went differently, but I answered as I did and God so help me.

“That’s terrible!” I did my best to look shocked. I mean, I was but shocked personally. Call me a horrible person for the conversation that followed but I needed to know. “How did it happen?”

“From what we could tell it was a heart attack. While you all were in the passenger car we radioed a doctor from C—, told him what we saw. It’s really terrible, poor Jenny went by to tell him that dinner was about to be served, the door opened as she knocked and there he was, on the floor in a crumpled heap.”

“Terrible, terrible thing. His family will be devastated; he was coming home to see them.” I felt slightly bad giving such information, no such more than lying about my acquaintanceship with the deceased but those small twinges felt were sharp nonetheless.

“The only thing is, I think he was murdered.” If my interested was piqued before it was doubly so at the present, a murder mystery on the rails; it seems like life was feeling awfully Hitchcockian. “When I was examining the body I found a mark on his neck, like a haphazard pinprick.”

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?” I felt it was a fairly obvious question but the shameful look on her face quelled any rising bile that I might have had to spew her way.

“I’m not sure completely, it’s just a feeling I have. It could be nothing, it could be murder, he could have nicked himself shaving and it just looks weird.”

“But why are you telling me this” I had already forgot that I was the one pretending to be his friend. She apparently overlooked this small slip of character.

“You’re the only one with an alibi that can do something; you were passed out in here while everyone else was roaming the train. It takes two to murder: one to kill and one to die.”

“What exactly am I supposed to do?” The answer felt obvious once she said it.

“I want you to go around and get information from people, alibis and what they saw. I know it’s much but if it is murder, the one who poisoned Mr. Argent will be loath to give any information to me.” I suppose this was God’s poetic way at getting back at me. For pretending to know a dead person I would be punished by being forced to talk to everyone on this train, to make the small talk that I hate so much. If curiosity leads to enlightenment, then I had just enlightened my way to a personal hell.

____ ____ ____

I spent the next hour talking to the passengers. There were the brother and sister on their way to visit grandma, not particularly the poisoning type. There was the elderly gentleman lacking the wherewithal to stay awake much less subdue a man and plunge a syringe into his neck. Two garrulous college girls, they were with Jenny the train-stewardess when she opened the door, they were the ones that screamed. Really, none of the passengers that I ‘interviewed’ seemed to know Christopher or be the syringe-in-the-neck kind of killers. Upon reaching this conclusion I decided it was time to check the personal effects of our dearly departed fellow traveler.

I snuck past the others and made my way into his room, thankfully it was still unlocked. I rummaged through his suitcase finding nothing other than a datebook willed with events he will never go to. I stooped over his body, searching for any sort of clue that could give me some sort of weapon but nothing came up other than the strange mark on his neck that indeed look like someone with no skill at all had plunged a syringe into his neck…or he nicked himself shaving. Well if he nicked it that oddly then he might have done it before. I moved his collar down only to see that there was another mark not that far from the first. Well obviously he had nicked it before, mystery solved I supposed unless he was bitten to death by a vampire. I laughed to myself at the notion but heard the door to the compartment start to open before I could produce anything audible. Acting on impulse I jumped into the closet and closed the door. It was the old man, however this time he was carrying something in his hands. I couldn’t see from my occluded viewpoint but my initial thoughts jumped to him being some sort of vampire hunter. He started reciting the last rites, must have been a priest and the shiny object must have been the rosary. I hadn’t been to a catholic service in a while but I was getting the gist that it was about to be over. The train gave a great lurch forward and abruptly came to a stop, but it was hardly time to be in C—, something must be wrong. Over my thinking I could hear a frenzied rush of whispers and what seemed to be the whimpering of the priest. The stop had knocked me to the floor and the dead man’s stored clothes were now all over me. The priest had obviously been knocked unconscious, now was my time to escape. When I stepped out of the closet I didn’t see the priest at all, only an open window, yet there on the ground, twinkling, was his rosary. I picked it up and snuck my way back into the group of people making their way toward the front sitting car. None of the passengers had known what compartment the dead man had been staying in, my stealth had been for nothing.

We had been waiting for 15 minutes as the train-stewards made their way to each compartment to see if everyone was alright. Seeing the faces all together made me notice who was missing right away: the priest, Jenny the train-stewardess, and the two college girls. The rest of the passengers were in slight disarray, being knocked down and tousled in a fury. I gave the cabin a once over again, perhaps I had missed the priest. Theresa saw me doing so and came over to reassure me.

“Jenny’s in the dining car with the two girls, one of them fell and hurt their ankle in the stop.” Theresa seemed happier; ‘at least nobody else was dead’ was the expression that could best describe her demeanor. As she was about to leave I brought to her attention the missing elderly man. “I didn’t see him when we made the checks. I’ll keep an eye out for him; he’s probably wandering the halls somewhere.”

“What’s going on with the train, exactly?” The brother brought up the question that should have been first on my mind. Apparently the one operating the train had been spooked by something running along the top of the roof. Jenny was helping the girls back into the cabin when the same spooked mad made an announcement over the intercom.

“We’re going to be starting our journey again in 30 minutes, we’re getting close to C—, I advise you all to stay where you are until we reach our destination.” I decided, since we were waiting and all, to bring attention to the disappearance of the old man. I was greeted by a bevy of no except for the sister; the sister had seen him going into his room five minutes before the train stopped, on her way to the sitting cabin. I asked her to show us the room, conductor be damned. A small group of us including Theresa made our way to the cabin, the dead man’s cabin; to see what we all knew was on the train, the dead body. The sister looked distressed, of the sort that she knew she was right so how could she be wrong. It was then that one of the passengers pointed out the marks on the neck of the poor accountant.

“Did something stab him in the neck?” “No, there would be blood everywhere.” “Maybe he nicked himself shaving?” “I’ve nicked myself before, never that badly. Plus the wounds look fresh” From the commiserating thoughts of my fellow passengers I decided to throw some levity into the situation. “Maybe it was a vampire?” A couple of the passengers laughed until it settled into malaise, accusatory glances sprang up in all directions.

The brother was the first to interject something into the silence “Well vampires drink the blood, if it was a vampire he should have no blood left in his body. Sis, go fetch me a knife from the dining car.” Dammit, what had I started?

____ ____ ____

Of course the result of the vampire-victim test was true; no blood came from a new cut on his finger. This left two mysteries: how do we deal with this dead body that would soon be a vampire and how do we deal with a vampire? Obviously I didn’t believe this one bit, bloodless corpse or no; my concern was for the missing passenger. The train started again and the debate continued on within this small compartment; I needed air. I was alone with my thoughts in the dining car, perhaps it would all go away if I drank myself into a stupor until journey’s end, perhaps not but it was worth a try. I walked to the back of the cabin, unaffected by the employee’s only sign; this was an emergency. I was greeted by a familiar face as I opened the cabinet; someone had placed the head of the priest in here. How curious. I fainted.

____ ____ ____

This time it was the screaming that woke me up, the girls were again the first people to arrive on the scene and had yet to close the cabinet, which I, the hitherto unconscious man, had to do. As jaded to violence and gore as much a high school English teacher should be, this was something new. It was successful in accomplishing that something wonky was indeed going on here, possibly vampire, possibly human, all around murderer. Neither of the two were great options. Thankfully the screaming brought all the passengers to the compartment. Nobody missing now except for the dead, we were doing a little bit better in attendance.

The girls were sitting down now, and I was clutching the bottle of brandy I had found hidden away near the cabinet for dear life. If riding the rails made me want to get drunk, doing so in close proximity to a severed head just bumped it up the priorities list. I started up. “So is it a vampire?” The rest of my passengers nodded in concurrence. “So what do we know about vampires?”

“They die in sunlight” “They don’t have a reflection” “Crosses and holy water hurt them” “They can be killed with a stake through the heart” “We don’t have any stakes” “Couldn’t we pull some wood from this train” “Please don’t damage train property” “But it’s an emergency” “Still no” “Doesn’t silver hurt them?” “No that’s werewolves” “Doesn’t mean we can’t try” “Fine, but where are we going to get silver” “No taking silverware from the train” “Is it one of us?” That was the question that settled everyone down. Basing it off of sunlight, all of the newest passengers were exempt as we boarded in the day. That would account for the siblings, the priest and two others. The girls, the exsanguinate, and three others were on it to begin with, which, if they stayed in their compartments wouldn’t have to worry about sunlight. However, it could have jumped aboard any time after dark, which left things open in the bad sort.

I sat down next to the blond college girl, Heather I think he name was. Her nerves had her twitchy, grimacing even on the verge of tears. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the priest’s rosary and played with it under the table. I counted the beads, that’s how it’s done isn’t it? You count the beads and pray? Melissa, brunette college girl, was across from me at the table.

“So what college are you guys from?” I was trying to start up a conversation, anything to get Heather’s mind off of the deaths. I began toying with the rosary some more, feeling the body on the cross.

“Heather here is from Purdue, I’m coming back from visiting a friend in Colorado. I go to Northwesterrn.” Melissa was talkative, Heather only put her head down and sobbed. “I’m majoring in physiology, interested in sports medicine.” The major suited her, even through winter clothes she seemed the sport type. “And Heather, I’m not sure what she’s majoring in, doesn’t really talk about it. You alright Heather?”

“I don’t feel well. This is all too much for me.” I reached over to comfort her only to have her slam into the window from jumping away from me; the rosary was still in my hand. She looked up with scarlet tears running down her face as Melissa screamed. We had found us a vampire. Heather clawed at the window but the ones in here don’t open. She was cornered. Before we knew what was happening Jenny had thrust a knife into the abdomen of the vampire. Trying to avoid the ensuing torrent of blood that would come I used my hands to shield myself, only to feel a brief flash of heat and then to taste in the air. Heather’s death was far less bloody that I had expected. I poured myself a glass of my filched brandy and drank until I couldn’t feel.

____ ____ ____

We never found the rest of the priest’s body and Christopher the accountant never rose up again from the grave. Apparently vampires have to do some sort of voodoo to turn you, Heather was simply a feeder. She’d get on and stay in her room until nightfall and come out and find a victim. The priest’s death was ruled an accident…somehow, my only hope is that his was the only bodiless head that I would see in real life, that’s all that mattered to me at least. I took a cab from the train station. Before we could get going someone else jumped in. Some graying woman, obviously inebriated she gave the driver directions and said hello to me.

“Coming from the train station as well? It’s great to meet a fellow traveler”

I instinctively clutched my rosary.

‘Who says you won’t?” The way she posed this question was borderline lewd in the sense of things. Not that I didn’t mind the attention, it was glorious in its foreseeable brevity. The buzzing fly of anxiety had bloomed into a full blown swarm, but this I didn’t mind, in fact it was preferable. It felt dangerous, she felt dangerous, and I felt lucky. Was this bad? Yeah, I guess so, but such is death.

Over the course of the night I got the chance to know her better and she got to know the illusion that was my being. I have personality, mind you, it’s just that it vaguely resembles the cynical asshole stuck in his own world. Life sucks, love sucks, and the only thing keeping us from offing ourselves is our fleeting beliefs in god. As conversation branched to the next I could tell my superficial wit and char was growing thin, most definitely due to drink and only catalyzed by her presence. The veneer was cracking but I had a feeling that she wouldn’t mind the cynical bastard that was the real me. I can’t quite remember exactly how much of my original paint shone through, again the drink’s issue, but the vibes were buzzing.

There are those feelings you get, when someone is so eerily close to your personality, that almost audible dissonance masking the silence between talking points. The nods of understanding, the finger running along the rim of the glass, the looks down and across; all the subtle flirting in the world and still that dissonance remains. Affection scares me outright and by all intents and purposes it was what she was initiating. Sex is not affection, sex is an action with a set goal that can be accomplished with relative ease or duty depending on your take of it. Affection isn’t as such. Affection has no goal, the only reason it exists is to exist.

Outline:

The Bar

1. Exposition by William
2. Introduction of Charlotte
3. Relationship Building
4. Some Background

Charlotte’s Apartment

1. Breakfast and the News
2. The Phonecall
3. Goodbyes

A Cafe

1. The Contract
2. The Person in question
3. The city at night

*The Way Back Home

1. The train and the lost child
2. Family
3. The bar and the brother

Florida

1. The Train
2. Taxi and Apartment
3. Investigation
4. Clues

New York

1. Emily
2. “I’ll see what I can do”

Iowa City

1. A Bar
2. The Handicapped
3. Anthony

Chicago again

1. Charlotte again
2. Night Chases
3. Night Trains

Minneapolis

1. The Hotel
2. *Charlotte’s Night Out
3. The Plight of the Poor
4. Javert’s Dilemma
5. The Bridge