Hekate's Child

Dumpster Fire

Bright lights of Portland started flickering on as the sun went down, the night waking up on its mischievous streets. The smell of burning garbage permeates the air mixing with the exhaust from the cars passing overhead on the I-5. A stiff breeze from the Willamette stirred the fire raging in the dumpster behind the OMSI Astronomer's building, adding the smell of boat fuel and fish to the already rancid smell. Two students stood there staring at the flickering blue and orange flames that leaped around the sobbing form of their best friend.

"So tell me Trick, did we not specifically say that Baily was a scheming whore," the girl sighed frustrated. Said scheming whore was currently on a bus with the rest of their class heading back to the dorms from the OMSI planetarium. Guess the teacher didn't notice three missing students or just didn't care. Jaz focused on the blunt in her hands trying not to lose any of the green as she rolled the paper between her fingers. Her ginger friend next to her focused his attention on the dumpster fire in front of them a strange expression in his green eyes.

"I do remember something like that," he agreed, "yeah." Patrick's face hardened into a rare moment of rage that promised a reckoning Jaz wondered if she wanted to be a part of. Granted the last time she helped him with something the football team's locker room became unusable for three months. Luckily the sludge bomb gave them an A in science class, even if the Principal suspended them from all after-school activities because of it.

She sealed the blunt and brought it to her lips. "And did we not, educate him on the dangers of hanging out with "The Squad", she made sarcastic air quotes with her fingers before pulling a zippo out of her boot. She lit the blunt and sucked in a lung full of smoke then passed the blunt to Trick.

"My Nanna always said that the Heart does make one do stupid things," Trick said sadly shaking his head. He took his hit tilting his head in contemplation. "What do you think we should do with him?"

Jaz mentally ran through her options as she took another hit. The Planetarium would be closed so they couldn't ask them to call the school and send a Counselor to help Colin calm down. That is if she can get past the fact that all three of them missed the bus heading back and that somehow it would be her fault. And there was nothing in her bag of necromancy tricks she could do right now besides call up the spirits of the dead in the area. She returned the blunt to Trick, "You got any ideas?"

This time Patrick's green eyes glinted mischievously, "I might." He took the blunt taking a long drag as he walked up to the dumpster. He took several long drags off of the blunt holding in enough smoke Jaz wondered briefly if she had to worry about her friend passing out from oxygen deprivation. She decided not to worry about that and pulled out her little baggie of stuff to roll another blunt as Trick handled the situation.

Patrick blew out a large cloud of smoke making a clockwise motion with his right hand while still holding the blunt with his left. His words were lost in the breeze but the weed smoke started to circle the blue flames. Wherever the smoke touched the flames turned a little green and purple streaked through the smoke itself. He knocked on the side of the dumpster trying to get his friend's attention. "Come on Colin, we've got to go."

"Go away," their friend cried the fire flaring up to an alarming blue. Patrick stood his ground taking another long pull off the joint. "I should die in here."

"There's no time for that," Jaz huffed joining Trick by the dumpster. "You've got to come out."

"Nothing matters anymore," came the plaintive whine from their friend.

Jaz and Trick shared an eye roll before the Ginger blew the smoke in his lungs adding it to the already green flames. Jaz closed her eyes and focused on what she sensed around her. Colin was a decent enough guy but they didn't have time to deal with his drama right now. So she found the corpses she needed already in the dumpster, half-burned by her friend's actions, and willed them into waking. It wasn't long before you could hear the scrabbling and squeaking of the rats as they climbed their way towards the top of the garbage heap heading towards the Firestarter.

"Oh, God," the first plea came with the fire going out completely. Jaz continued to focus on the rats getting them to limp over trash and piles of ash. "God, no!" Colin scrambled away from the rats kicking more trash in their direction. "Please, make it stop."

"Then get out of the dumpster dude," Trick advised keeping one eye on Jaz. "Can't make it stop while you are still inside." He didn't like her raising the dead even on such a small scale but they were out of options and were about to miss the bus back to school.

There was a high-pitched scream as one of the rats began to climb up his leg causing Colin to pull himself out of the dumpster. He has covered in trash and ash a partially burnt corpse of a rat clinging to his leg. Jaz opened her eyes letting the rats go back to sleep, the one clinging to Colin dropped as if it were never alive making a wet squelch on the pavement. "There we go," she cheered handing over a partially smoked blunt. "Let's get going before we miss the bus."

Only the bus wasn't in the parking lot when they got there. "Well, that fucking sucks," Trick cursed staring at the spot the school bus used to be. "You'd think they would notice a few missing students."

"Like they would notice us if we were there," Jaz sighed. "So, Kit's then?'

"Yeah," Colin agreed dejected. "Let's head to Kit's."