The smoke seeps gently from my nose, catching on the soft breeze that carries the sounds of raucous laughter from the bars below. I let the burn settle into my lungs, feeling that urgency slowly rise as the oxygen depletes from my blood. My body quickly wins out, forcing me to exhale the sweet cigarette smoke in favour of the night air. The wisps catch the garish light from the new neon signs that seem to be littering the front of every bar on the street. Their light reflects from the wet asphalt below making a filthy rainbow that's danced upon by too-drunk men and women celebrating another day of the high life. Everything seems to be changing so quick, at least in the last few years.
Lady Luxury wanders out onto the balcony with me, her fingers gently caressing the scars on my back and working their way round to the matching scars on my chest. She drapes her arms across me and stares across the cityscape with me for a while. I offer her a pull on my cigarette, her red lipstick leaves a tiny trace on its end that I can faintly taste.
"Are you coming back to bed Tommy?"
I turn and look at those dazzling green eyes of hers, they catch the light from below like fireworks. Her perfume pushes through the scent of smoke, lighting a fire in me built on sweet things and seduction. She steps away, wandering back into the darkened room and letting her silken robe glide from her pale shoulders.
The call of the city draws my attention again as I take another long pull on my salvation. So many misguided souls wandering the streets. Cheap liquor and big pay checks turning civilised Mary-Sues and Mr Jones' into this decade's new darlings. Their guardians float behind them, careful not to touch the living.
Judge sits on the rail to my right with his legs dangling over the ten story drop below, watching the crowds for anything that might catch our interest.
"You're making me nervous sitting like that."
"I thought you didn't get nervous?" He asks me, oozing sarcasm and throwing my earlier confidence back in my face. I sit out his attitude for a while before he swings his legs underneath him and through the railing. He knows defying physics in front of me like that makes my eyes itch.
"What's your problem tonight?"
He grimaces as he glances back into the room where Lady Luxury's guardian stares at us both, confounded by our exchange. She looks just like her, the same way Judge looks just like me, except they're missing all the little imperfections that make us human. My dark hair flecked with grey where his is solid, in that translucent bluish guardian kind of way. The only imperfection we share are the scars spattered across my torso. The ones that killed me three years ago today. I always thought death was a permanent affair but it seemed the good doctors of the world had better plans. He can't blame me for letting my hair down for the occasion.
"He can see you?" She shrieks at Judge. His glare could burn holes through steel as he stares at me, doing his best to ignore the guardian behind us. Drawing attention to the fact I could not only see but talk to guardians was always bad news, the kind of news that travels fast to dead and demonic ears.
"Yeah. I can see you too," I say to her while meeting Judges glare. He's not the only one who can be petulant.
Ice washes up my spine and slams into the back of my skull, the sound of chains snapping crashes into my ears and stuns me. My attention shoots back over the railing and I look down to the crowds again. There's a small break in the flow where they've subconsciously pushed away from a man who walks with hands in his pockets and a cheery smile. His guardian is gone, possessed by something horrid that shouldn't exist on this plane and tethered to it are several guardians with incorporeal chains sprouting from their chests. The sickness spreads from my feet up to my ears until the nausea is staggering. This is bad. Judge stares in awe until I flick the dying end of my cigarette over the balcony and rush back inside past the still waiting guardian of Lady Luxury.
Call it a hunch, maybe my job and bitter experience has made me paranoid, but I think someone has just been murdered in this city.
Sometimes I wish I could be wrong.
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Thanks for the tag KaranSeraph
As the summary mentioned this short story has been written for the challenge set by ParanormalCommunity in celebration of #HappyDeathDay
The ten people I'd like to tag to take part are:
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#HappyDeathDay - Guardian: Teaser
ParanormalTommy relaxes after a long night celebrating. Most people wouldn't consider the day they died a cause for celebration but most people aren't brought back to life. Even less are brought back with the ability, the curse, that Tommy now wields. This is...
