Ephemeral

chapters 5-6

Chapter Five

How far had they gone? It was hard to tell, sometimes it felt like they were finally reaching the end of the city only to turn a corner and see another set of office buildings and apartments plaguing the streets with their mundanity. Their pace was considerably slower than it had been when they had set out that morning, which meant a lot as they were walking slow to begin with. several clouds had filled the sky, but they didn't threaten rain so much as they did an earlier nightfall. Clive looked towards Veeno, should he suggest finding shelter? Despite his seniority and the fact that he had been the one to invite Veeno to travel with him, he still felt secondary to the teen. Whether Clive truly had a subconscious respect for Veeno or just simply didn't have the energy to fight for the authority, he didn't know, yet something about specifically Veeno having so much control bugged him no matter how depressed he became.

"Should we find somewhere to spend the night, soon?" Clive asked, his thick Australian accent emphasized every word. He pulled a cigarette packet from his jacket pocket. Clive fiddled with the carboard box, opening the top and flipping it, catching a cigarette in his palm as it fell from its place, pushing the other stray ones back in with the side of his hand. The man balanced the cigarette between his lips as he held out the box to Veeno. Clive wasn't sure if Veeno had been a smoker prior to their meeting but since, every time Clive had offered him a cigarette, the boy had taken it without any hesitation, though he did seem to be somewhat unuse to the smoke and often had to cough it from his lungs.

"No. There's time." Veeno's tone was dull, and his eyes were flat as he checked the watch around his wrist. Clive put his cigarettes back in his shirt pocket, the top of the box still poking out, and replaced the empty space in his hand with a lighter.

"But the clouds are pretty gloomy, don't you think? It's gonna make it darker a whole lot sooner." Clive cupped his hand around his cigarette as he lit it, breathing in the burning tobacco as he flipped the lighter shut, passing it over to Veeno.

"Maybe... if it makes you so uncomfortable, we can stop." Veeno scoffed, not really wanting to walk much further either, but refusing to let Clive dictate their schedule "Though I would have thought you'd rather make up the distance instead."

"I'm being realistic."

"No, I am being realistic! You're being scared. If we stop so early every day we won't get very far, will we?" Veeno crossed his arms, as he looked at Clive from the corner of his eye, his face twisting into a grimace.

"You're not scared? Have you seen those things actually kill someone?" Clive threw his arms out dramatically as if that somehow strengthened his point.

"That's irrelevant." Veeno's eyes widen for a second before falling back into their bored, natural expression. "And anyway, it's not like the day suddenly makes it safe from the ashmen either."

"Maybe not... but I've never seen one with enough of the balls to run out into the sunlight."

Chapter Six

Speckles of sunlight passed through the gaps in the clouds and lit up sections of the road whilst other areas were cast in shade creating a marvellous and fantastical scene. By now Veeno had acknowledged - internally - that perhaps they had walked too long, though he would never tell Clive that. The cloud's shade made way for the ashmen to comfortably walk around, though at this point, it was still easy enough to avoid them so long as you stayed close to the light... soon it would become much harder. Veeno pulled up his coat sleeve and checked his watch, it was only late afternoon, yet the clouds pouring in became increasingly darker and threatened to veil the remaining light. However, Veeno truly only realised this to be an issue when he was eventually forced to aim and fire his gun at one of the ashmen who had come far too close for comfort. Interestingly, this was also the moment Veeno learnt that though the bullets would lodge into the monsters' bodies, it wouldn't harm them in any sense other than creating a hole in its peculiar anatomy.