The Black Tapes: Or, How the Bouncer Bounced Back

"Well shit, boy, I don't know how the world went south, but I was there and let me tell you it wasn't as smooth and savory as people make it out like it is," Norm said.

Carson smiled. "You're full of shit, old man."

The fire reflected off Norm's eyes. The old man didn't smile back, but there was light in those orbs.

"You're egging me on," Norm said. "You want me to sit here and tell you the whole story, so that I can lose all my sleep and wake up grumpy tomorrow."

"I'm bored enough," Carson said, rubbing his hands. "And it's cold as fuck."

"Watch your tongue, boy."

"Hey, c'mon Norm, what the fuck!" Beck whined. "You said you'd tell it. The kids, they like the story. Kinda like a movie, but, you know...boring."

Carson slapped his legs and laughed. The three boys sitting around the fire fell in line, exaggerating their own tittering.

"I might be an old nigga but I know when you boys are pushing me and right now you're pushing me." Norm crossed his arms. "I want a full night's sleep. It's all I have now. With your grandma dead, all I wanna do is sleep."

"You've been sleeping all day, old man," Beck said. "Just sitting there on your porch, whining and hollering. We just want to hear the story."

Norm sighed. He looked down at the three boys, who put their palms together and cried, "Please!"

"Oh all right, all right," Norm muttered. "But it's only because of you boys, not them." He pointed at Carson and then Beck. "And because it's a story worth repeating. Never forget your history, boys, especially if it's nice and recent. That's when the shit is interesting, when it's fresh."

Carson drank from a bottle, tilting his head back. He wiped his mouth and said, "Well, go on! We don't have all night."

"Well you better clear your busy schedule, because this ain't no storytale! Shit. All right, here goes. Y'all ready?"

The boys cried out, wiggling where they sat.

"All right, all right."

Norm went closer to the fire. The flames animated his face, making him look like some holy ghost that had just come out of benediction.

"It began here," Norm said, waving his hand towards rusted walls and dead buildings. "Not so long ago, not so long ago. Not even twenty years! Shit, it feels like a lifetime. You see boys, things were very different, and it wasn't just 'cause there was more money. No, there was a difference in our souls, you see. We loved ourselves so much we couldn't even see past our own eyes. Clockwork toys, you see."

Norm looked up and nodded. "Yeah. Clockwork toys..."

***

God, we had everything! We were a society apart. We knew there were others, but we didn't care. We long stopped trying to get a handle on the world. For too long we had tried, and for too long we had failed. If you're not giving it your all, people will sniff it out, and take advantage. Doesn't take a historian to know it. All you have to do is look around. Anyways, that's when the walls came up. Oh, we had walls before, big old ones that covered the sun. But this was something different, something you couldn't see or touch. These were walls of the soul, boys. Walls of the soul.

Marco

Out ahead, across a flat land, sat a city asleep. The sun had not come yet and the moon had vanished. There was nothing, just the city and the land, and the quiet was so incredible the wind was allowed to inquire. If this was the afterlife then it was an afterlife for fools for there was no warmth here, no life.