WARNING: USE OF EXPLICIT LANGUAGE BODY HORROR, ABUSE AND SEXUAL THEMES

The street suns were starting to get brighter, the hologram sky above had turned a shade of deep blue, and even though it was imaginary, Claire felt a chill in the air.

She was traversing narrow catacomb like streets, the same streets she had walked  for the past year while travelling between house and work, today was no different. she was returning home from work then, a little lost in thought; no particular thought but rather a mixed bag of different things.

How the capital city looked so much different then the farming state where she grew up had run away from. It seemed, colder. She felt distant, hadn't managed to find a boyfriend, not even any good friends. The work was... Normal, it wasnt bad, but not what she expected it to be, working as a reporter for a local gossip magazine doesnt open chances for much action. It felt as if all her assumptions were wrong, she had even started to miss home, something she thought would never happen.

The rose tinted glasses were slowly coming off.

But she knew she had to carry forward, Miss Marilla in Miss Marilla's podcast had told her. Miss Marilla was one of the continent's most famous reporter, and was Claire's role model. In fact, she was the reason Claire fell in love with the idea of reporting and the reason she eascaped her home to come to the capital.

Disaster had struck her when 22 year old Claire had arrived to the city in the form of her belongings getting stolen. The police had helped her alot then, they couldn't find all her bags but provided her with accomodation in the suburbs in the eastern front. The house belonged to a retired old police woman. Claire had thought that she would be strict due to her old job but it was quite the opposite, the woman, "Mrs. Drun" was as sweet-old-lady-like as you can get. Mr Drun had passed away a long time ago, and she had lived alone but often had police visitors, juniors and old acquaintances.

While engulfed in her thoughts, she found herself in front of her apartment. The window was draped but she could make out silhouettes due to the room lights. Mrs. Drun wasn't alone.

"A Visitor! An odd time for her usual visitors", Claire wondered.

Mrs. Durn readily resolved her confusion about the visitor when she giddily introduced her to the mysterious Visitor,

"Claire! Meet Ralph, what a fine young man, working hard for the good of our society." Mrs Durn said as she led Claire by the hand from the hallway to the living space.

Claire realised what it was, the guy, "Ralph" was a salesman, Mrs. Durn did that alot, inviting salespersons in the house and treating them like royal visitors. Claire believed that the age was certainly getting to this woman's head.

"Oh my I see two beauties coming towards me!" Ralph said, he was sitting on the sofa, almost as if he owned it.

"Oh shush you! I am just an old lady" Mrs Drun said, giggling.

"Whaaa, whose old, not you, i see a young and beautiful lady in front of me, well, two now, who is this Mrs. Durn" Enton said, placing the tea cup down on the table and looking at Claire.

"Ah, this is Claire, my tenant, isn't she a beauty?" Mrs. Durn said and turned to Claire. "And Claire, this is Ralph, he came here to sell these new suns, look! These are so much better I tell you. And look here, our old sun had a CHIP!! The government is spying on us! I was right!"

"Indeed Mrs. Durn" Ralph chimed in, "These chips, hear and quite possibly even see what is going on around you, hiding in your suns, these get full access to your person!! Imagine, eating, sleeping, even in the bathroom, Oh! the horror."

Mrs Durn Gasped, "He's right Claire, I dont want people to see me naked! I am getting 2 of these, you should get one too!"

"Of course, they might be a bit more expensive than the ones "they" provide, but you cant place a price tag on privacy right?" Ralph said.

"Oh? How much is it?" Claire chimed in, she could have got up and gone upstairs long ago but there wasnt much to do and this was more entertaining anyways, so she had decided to indulge in this.

"Just 19000 ko!" Ralph said.

"Aah! Deal, I'm getting two!" Mrs. Durn was enthusiastic.

"19000?? Thats like double the price of regular suns!" Claire gave a mean look to Ralph and then turned to Mrs. Durn "I - I'm not planning on investing in new suns right now, I'll be going now Mrs. Durn, see you tomorrow."

She left promptly.

****

Enton walked through the virtual moonlit streets with a satisfied expression. His head rocking back and forth to an unknown tune, his left hand swinging a light, supposedly empty suitcase and his right hand throwing a green chip and catching it.

The gullible are preyed upon. That was the rule of the street. He had spent a better part of his teenage life learning this. Now as a 23 year old adult, he had taken the role of the predator.

But while he was a crook by definition, his values differed from his contemporaries, for starters, he never enjoyed or hated conning people, it was just a thing he did, he did remember how he was on the receiving end of it in the past and thus had some sympathy for the people he cheated, but not much more than that, once the job was done he was quick to move on. Like with that lady ...."Mrs. Drum or something", out of sight and out of mind.

****

Claire was on the streets again, trying her best to stay on the tail of the man who had just left her house, while concealing herself in the shadows. This was the reporter in her awakened to the maximum capacity, she could almost physically smell a story in him, what kind of story? She didn't know, but her gut told her to follow him.

With all the knowledge of mystery/detective movies she had watched growing up, she knew exactly how to proceed. Night-time was the best for this, keep your footsteps in sync with the footsteps of the person you are following, always keep a hiding spot ready and...

And she had lost him.

She was so busy  reveling in her knowledge bank of shadow manoeuvre that she lost track of him. She found herself standing in a circular open area surrounded by alternate buildings and alley openings.

Like the ancient ostrich, she lifted her head and looked around when suddenly she felt a tug at her arm. Before she could react to that, she was pulled, twisted and then pinned against a wall. She felt a warm breath close to her skin, a dark visage loomed over her.

Instinctively she opend her mouth to scream but was obstructed by a hand.

"Jeez Lady, you'll wake everyone up, calm down" Enton said, while loosening his grip.

Claire was taken aback, "Ralph! You! H-"

Aaa tut tut tut, he interrupted her "I question you, why were you following me?"

"I am a reporter, I-, I know you are a con artist, I want to do a story with you!"

"Reporter? You are crazy, that's what you are! You followed a shady man to back alleys in the middle of the night alone? Even I wouldn't do that!"

"When you put it that way, I suppose you are right." 

"Well no shit, now go back to where you came from and I go my way, Sayonara!"

"But the report.." Claire started.

"I dont wanna, now go!"

"I- I will report you if you don't comply!"

"Hah! Go ahead, The cops will have a sweet time finding "Ralph the salesman", and btw, I know you won't, you aren't a saint either, you watched as I scammed the shit out of that drummer lady, isn't that right?"

"Don't try to guilt trip me! You're the one who did the scamming!"

"Well that what I do! Now get off me!"

****

Enton was walking on the bridge, above the sea of moving cars, the scene was pretty picturesque. On nights like these, he wished there was someone with him.

But not on this night!

"You are not even trying to hide now. Why? What would it take to get you off my back?!"

"I just want to interview you, come on!"

"And I keep saying repeatedly that I want none-"

"So Ralph is not your real name, what is it?"

"And now you are not even listening to me, great" *sigh* "No, its not, my name is Enton"

"Is Enton a real name name?"

"It is A name." He said wryly.

"Right, well Enton is a pretty caucasian name and you look like middle eastern or Indian, so I'm guessing not."

"Ho Ho Ho! Look we have a racist on our hands!" Enton laughed.

"What? No!! I didnt mean it-"

"Look lady-"

"Claire, my name is Claire!"

"Yea yeah, look Clara, its a well known fact that when people came down underground, there were no boundaries, no communities and no individuality, just a large mass of people, eating, drinking and shitting, and everybody fucked everybody! Its baffling how people like you can even make out race, you have seriously offended me!" Enton faked an angry expression.

"Fuck you, seriously-"

"Will you?" He said cheekily grinning.

"Arrrgh, so annoying, you are so annoying!" She frowned

"Trust me, the feeling is mutual."

"I wont leave you this easily though, I-"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH"

Claire was cut short by the sound of someone shouting, clearly in distress. She looked around, while walking with Enton, she had reached an unfamiliar part of the city, this area was even quieter than the eastern suburbs where she lived, the houses seemed to be abandoned.

"This way, I think it came from the old park." Enton said and motioned Claire to follow.

Indeed the sounds were coming from the park. And there was more than one sound.

Claire and Enton approached the boundary and hid below the boarded fence.

"I'll keep a look out, you peep to see what's up" Enton whispered to her.

Claire got up slowly. The park was dimly lit but she could make out the woman more or less, she was wearing a one piece torn from the front, the makeup on her face was smeared, probably due to all the crying. The skin on her hands and thighs seemed to have large bruise or burn marks, she couldn't tell exactly.

The woman had tripped and fallen down when claire saw her. She wasnt crying for help anymore but had turned in the direction she was running from and started to drag herself back muttering something.

Then Claire saw several men appear from the direction she was looking in, at this point there was abject terror in that woman's eyes, she had started shaking. One of the men, dressed in a white suit approached her and bent down to her, slowly moving his hand towards her.

"Hey, whats happening there? Cally?"

He tried asking her multiple times but there was bo response, he turned around and looked up to see Claire transfixed, he eyes wide and body shaking. Morbid curiosity took over him and he stood up as well.

The man in white suit had crouched down, he was touching... something. Enton saw a pile of flesh, a hand sticking up from above and and eyeball that seemed to be staring right at him. The surface of the skin was bubbling and steam of some kind was escaping from them. The man seemed to be absorbing the blob, it was growing progressively smaller.

"Wh- What is this???!!!??" Claire said, eyes still fixed at the horrifying scene in front of her.

Enton didn't look at her, he was just as shocked, under his breath, he uttered, "It is real, assim-"

*WHACK!* *WHACK!*

"Get them in the van, Boss will be so pissed."

TO BE CONTINUED-

Hello, if you made it this far, thank you for reading :) I have had this story for a while now and I'm excited to share it with everyone.