What follows is a story of Endless City; a never-ending urban sprawl of both the strange and familiar. It is a mixed place of unnatural phenomena and beat up bus stops, alien cultures and convenience stores, so large and old its residents have forgo...
I sold my soul on a Wednesday. Or, to be more precise, 65.4 percent of it. It might be too early to say if I got a good deal. I wasn't looking to make any bargains with nefarious beings using my soul as currency that day, but hey, who ever does their first time?
I knew that the story I was writing was important, but not so important that it would take the lion's share of my spiritual essence. Then again in that late afternoon I was so tired passers-by might have assumed I had already lost the entire thing. My apartment hadn't contained anything worth eating that morning, and I was running on dark coffee and fumes. After seven and a half hours of leg work made soggy by the shit weather Downtown was having, I was finally speeding towards home aboard a minor rail of the Inner City Subway. I'd spent the day chasing a story, but by the time I'd gotten settled in the subway car I had begun to worry the story had started chasing me.
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The locals call this line "the red tube" on account of the chipped paint job on the exterior of its cars. It had been a long day, talking to people who didn't want to talk, watching people who didn't want to be watched. That's mainly what a reporter's job is. That and deadlines; a word I think might be the most well crafted in our entire language. My editor often calls them "dreadlines", which might be a solid competitor. The deadline for the story I was working on was set for Thursday evening, the following day. Usually when a person worries about a deadline it's because they haven't done the work and they've run out of time. This time I had already done the work. The prose was good, and it would only need an hour or two more of drafting. Honestly, the story would have made Jack, my mentor, proud. He would appreciate the subject matter, and some of the better turns of phrase I had worked in. But my mood only further soured at the thought of him. Time to worry about that mess later. No, that Wednesday I wasn't worrying about what would happen if my writing was late. I was worried about what would happen if I handed the story over at all.
A bum on the subway snorted loudly near me, yanking my attention away from my inner dialogue, but it was a false alarm. Scratching herself, Ericka was already falling back asleep, stretched out along the three or four seats opposite me. She often talked to me when she was awake, and I didn't mind it. The homeless hear and see a lot more than the uppity would care to know, and I'd gotten a fair share of leads from folks like Ericka. I didn't pretend to like hanging out with them, but it paid in my profession to have sharp eyes and ears paired with a dull nose. Today though, I was glad she was asleep. I had other things to worry about.
The end of the subway car to my right held an older man carrying brown grocery bags and a gaggle of teens throwing small things at Ericka and giggling. Ericka either didn't notice or didn't mind, so I didn't say anything. I was more concerned with the passengers on the opposite side of the car and was doing my best not to be caught observing them.
Two large men in gray pinstriped suits and trilby hats-one thin and wiry, the other boxy and wide. They stood out like sore thumbs. Most people that ride these subways can't afford not to. When a businessman's car isn't available they might ride the prime monorail or the deluxe express, but not the red tube. This was an economy line that hadn't seen a maintenance service or a janitor in only the King knew how long. A place for grocery shopping old men, truant teenagers, homeless vagrants, and down on their luck reporters. Not well dressed muscle bound men in suits. All the more suspicious, they had gotten on at the same stop I had. Would they get off at Prismatic Plaza's Stop Twenty-Seven with me? If they did, did they have business there? or was I their business?
