The bus rolled to a stop at an RV park at the edge of the city. The road that continued beyond the park led into the green mountains and woods that lied to the left of the road. To its right was the RV park that stationed about a dozen RVs spread really apart. The RV park itself extended up to a steep slope, below which was a train station. From the edge of that cliff, the entirety of the mechanized city, that lied far below, could be seen.
It was calm at the park. An old man sat at the edge of the staircase to, what probably was, his RV, adjusting his old pair of glasses looking at a piece of magazine with moving pictures on it. He squinted his eyes as the image transitioned to a hot model in lingerie, that earned him a bonk with a pan delivered to his head by his wife from behind, who then gestured with an annoyed expression to move aside to let her out.
Little Theo, in his little white and brown uniform, leaped out of the bus and crossed the road carefully. He made his way through the RV park which seemed empty, smiling at the old couple, who, putting aside their rows, returned the little kid's innocent smile. 'Good afternoon, Mrs. Greg.'
'Good afternoon, dear,' Mrs. Greg stopped the walk to the kitchen window and joined the conversation. 'How was school today?'
'It was great,' little Theo replied enthusiastically. 'Miss Brown gave me a sticker for getting top marks in Tyrese.'
He held the collar of his shirt displaying the smiley-face to the old couple.
'Aww,' Mrs. Greg patted Theo on the head. 'Congratulations!'
'Well,' Theo said, heading away with a smile. 'I should go; bye Mrs. Greg, bye Mr. Greg.'
The old couple waved Theo goodbye and got back to their work killing time.
'Dad!' Theo opened the RV door and walked in. The RV, unexpectedly to little Theo, was empty. Once the doors closed there was no noise within the threshold. There were unwashed dishes in the sink, which Theo thought was unordinary for his father's daily routine. What was even more unordinary was Theo's favorite dish prepared for lunch, that he discovered after walking to the dining table. He didn't have to open the lid to know the smell of his dad's Alfredo sauce.
'Eat me! :)' was what the card leaning against the flower vase on the dining table read, which Theo only noticed after climbing onto his chair to do just that. On the table, closer to the closed pan was an empty ceramic plate. Theo, being his usual self, pushed away the ceramic plate and pulled the pan itself closer. Then without further ado, he picked up the fork and dug into the pasta and the chicken.
It was a blissful five minutes for Theo, just gulping all that was prepared for him. It was colder than he would have liked, and the chicken was a little overdone, but Theo's taste buds could comprehend no difference. He didn't even hesitate to question the note or the fact his father did not join him for lunch like he usually does. Every drop of sauce had to disappear from the plate for Theo to snap back into reality.
There was cheese all over Theo's lips by the time he was done. Only today had he gotten a sticker from miss brown and now this? Theo was unquestionably overwhelmed. He carried the plate to the dishwasher and loaded it in. He then proceeded to load the rest of the filthy dishes into the dishwasher hoping to take a little bit of the workload off his father's shoulder. After he was done, he gulped down a glass of water and sat on the couch staring at the TV.
The TV turned on the moment he sat down, but little Theo didn't feel like watching anything, instead he wanted to play a game, which he felt he deserved after the sticker. So, little Theo, abiding by his plan, picked up the controller from the table to his side and pressed a couple of buttons. The TV did not respond. He clicked a little more, now getting slightly annoyed and a text popped up on screen 'Parental lock on. Login to disable.'
'Dad!' Theo said in frustration. There was no reply.
'Dad?' Theo inquired the RV, now beginning to get concerned.
Theo peeked into his dad's room; it was empty. The bathroom was not locked; it was empty as well.
Theo's dad used to work a night shift at the train station nearby, but for the past week he didn't go to work. Theo was unquestionably happy with this change, getting to have his breakfast at home and getting to see his father whenever he's home. He was ecstatic about not having to sleep alone at night and not having to adhere to security measures in the night when his dad is not usually in the RV. Hence, for a dad who was always home, regardless to say, this was unusual.
Theo stepped out of the RV. There was no one around to be seen, and most importantly not dad. The old couple next door had gotten into their RV and had closed the doors behind them, and the rest has either also done that, or they were away; there was no way to know for sure.
'Mrs. Greg?' Theo knocked on the door to the old couple's RV. 'Mrs. Greg.'
Mrs. Greg did not show up, it was Mr. Greg that answered the door on her behalf. 'Yes?'
'Oh, sorry... Did you see where dad went?'
'He went out about half an hour ago, probably down to the station.'
'Oh, thank you,' Theo smiled at the old man and rushed away. The old grumpy man went back inside and closed the door behind him.
Just as every other day, the station was overrun with hordes of people rushing from and to trains heading to all over the country. The congestion inside the station was handled perfectly and there never was a line that had stopped moving. Through the crowds Theo marched forward. His eye caught a familiar face of a faceless android in a train conductor's uniform.
'Bill!' Theo walked up to the android and spoke.
'Theo,' the android replied, bending slightly down to match Theo's height. 'What brings you down here today?'
'I'm looking for my dad,' Theo replied, looking up and down at the crowds. 'Did you see him?'
'I think your dad is in the head office,' the android replied in a warm tone. 'I saw him heading there.'
'Thank you, Bill!'
Theo rushed back into the crowd. He wasn't quite sure where the head office was, but he, from experience, almost instinctively knew where to go. Passing two train platforms, one empty and one occupied, he went on his way to the opposite edge of the station. The more he progressed, the more chaos was approaching. There were lines not moving. Then there were lines breaking into crowds of people and finally there was one large clump of people surrounding one particular train.
All the cars in all of the trains were lit inside and the light glowed through the windows, but half of the cars of this particular train were dark inside. The crowd was complaining and chatting, creating a loud wall of chaos.
There was a man on top of the train messing with some cables on the roof. He then stood up fast, holding onto the insulating cover of a rather large cable. As it was being pulled away, it sparked electricity onto the roof of the train. His face was covered in sweat and tears. His shirt was unbuttoned at the top half and one of the two pant legs were folded up. The man on the top of the roof, who was a stranger to most, was no stranger to little Theo. 'Dad!'
'YOU ALL ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS!' he screamed from the top of his lungs, tearing up. 'YOU HEARTLESS MONSTERS!'
Little Theo understood none of the theatrics. The wire on dad's hand seemed scary, but he envisioned his dad putting it back in place repairing the train, so the rest of the cars light up, and climbing down to talk about his sticker.
'The men you pushed into power,' Theo's dad screamed as loud as he could. 'They DESTROYED MY LIFE!'
'Your life isn't that bad daddy! You have me,' little Theo thought now slowly starting to get concerned. He had seen his dad on the roof of a train before, but not in tears and definitely not screaming at the crowd.
'Do it, you coward!' a voice screamed from the crowd and a few teenagers broke into an inaudible laughter that blended with the voices in chaos.
Theo's father's facial expression changed slowly. It was no longer angry or sad, it was fed up. A final drop of tear flowed out of his eye and joined the rest that covered his face.
'Monsters,' he said quietly as he drove the exposed cable into his chest.
The man exploded, broke into a ball of fire and in an instant turned into charcoal. The complex architecture of flesh and bones, intricately assembled to hold in a dear life, and provide that life with more meaning than any other combination of molecules would have, had been ignited by itself; a result of a simple miscalculation. As the wire detached from his burnt body, whatever remained after the ignition collapsed on to the top of the roof.
The wire that landed on the top of the roof sparked into flames and lodged itself into the steel. The lights inside the cars started flickering on and off as people inside started screaming. The chaos outside the cars grew in response. It all happened in an instant that Theo did not have enough time to scream his little heart out.
'DAAAAD!' through the crowds trying to get out of the train, Theo tried to make his way forward. He was being pushed away, but he kept trying to get close. Traveling bags, handbags, water bottles; anything that the crowds running away carried, hit hard against little Theo's body, that before long, his face was bruised, and his nose was bleeding. 'DAAAAD!!!'
Suddenly from within the crowds a dark-skinned young man emerged. He had his own set of cheap, damaged and mended set of clothes on, and hair braided into dreadlocks. He dashed over to little Theo, wrapped his arms around him and keeping Theo's eyes covered from the chaos, the young man carried Theo away.
'No, NO!' Theo screamed.
'Shh, it's alright,' the young man continued carrying Theo away against the resistance. 'Everything's alright.'
Theo stopped screaming, giving up himself to the tears that drowned his eyes. With time, with the gaining distance and with the blurring vision, the chaos at the station slowly grew out of sight and little Theo was left to find his way on his own.
And he did.
When his eyes opened into the darkness a dark blue glow was sneaking into his room from under the door. The lights in the room slowly turned on, letting his eyes adjust to the brightness slowly, revealing what in the room that the darkness hid.
The room was mostly empty except for one cupboard and a nightstand next to the bed. On top of the nightstand there was an old-fashioned wireless table lamp and lying next to it was an expensive watch with a shattered crystal.
'Good morning, sir,' a male voice greeted the man. 'You have a new message waiting, should I put it through?'
'Put it through,' he resorted to the minimum number of words he could.
Then a female voice proceeded on with the rest of the delivery. 'Hey sparkles, we are going to Centerfold to pick up rent. If we aren't back when you wake up and you feel like it, feel free to join. Ok, bye.'
He got up from his bed, kept sitting on it for a moment before he proceeded to get up and get ready. Pulling articles of clothes, one by one, from the cupboard he put them on, finally finishing up with the broken wristwatch around his wrist.
The Centerfold neighborhood existed around a roundabout with one exit. There were houses around, that even before the shatter were parts of the most peaceful neighborhood in the city from being a known dead-end. At the center of the roundabout was a white statue of a man, riding on a galloping horse. The statue was only attached to the ground from one of its rear legs hence it appeared very unstable, for all forty years it was there. After years of peace however, now there were unwelcome visitors in the neighborhood.
Men, in black vests, armed with rifles, were standing in front of the only two storied building around the neighborhood. From inside, a rather old man was thrown out. He flew over the short staircase at the front door, landed on his feet breaking the fall, but then trampled back on to the ground unable to control his momentum.
From inside, a woman in a leather jacket walked out. Purple streaks decorated her hair and piercings her nose. She stepped out of the house, casually holding a rifle herself.
'Where's the money, Mr. Denis?' she asked, stopping at the old man lying on the floor. 'It's been two months.'
'I don't have the money,' the old man stuttered.
'What about your allowance old man?' the woman asked, now squatting next to the old man, getting closer to him.
'I was diagnosed with Schizophrenia about a month ago, miss,' the old man said. 'I had to spend my allowance on medication.'
'Well, that's no excuse, is it?' the woman asked condescendingly. 'You need to prioritize your spendings, Mr. Denis. After all, you have to 'live' to take the medicine, don't you?'
The old man was too scared to respond and the woman in the leather jacket was too bored to keep the inquiry up.
'Pick him up,' the woman got back onto her feet. Two of the men in black walked over to the old man, pulled him up to his feet from either side and without letting go, they started escorting the old man away.
'Let him go Valerie,' A familiar voice demanded from across the street. It grabbed the attention of the woman in the leather jacket.
On the other side of the street stood a dark-skinned man, in a white t-shirt and black pants. His hair was braided into dreadlocks and in his hand, he was carrying a steel rod in his left hand, implying nothing other than he meant business with his threats.
'Oh, hello there spaghetti boy,' the woman replied. 'Didn't know you lived here too.'
Now more and more people were getting out of their houses onto their lawns to observe the kerfuffle.
'Let the old man go,' Aion warned, swinging the stopwatch, strapped to his wrist by its golden chain, onto his palm. 'I won't warn you twice.'
'Why don't you crawl back to your hole?' Valerie did not retreat. 'This is none of your business.'
Aion stepped closer and started walking closer to the gang of soldiers. All the soldiers one by one toggled the safety on their rifles. The old man collapsed onto the ground once again when he was let go and in the little time he had, he slowly crawled away to a side. Valerie adjusted her own rifle, now ready to engage.
'Just can't take a hint, can you?' Valerie mumbled. 'Engage!'
Bullets were fired, only for them to pause in air and push back with Aion, who kept walking forward. The stasis shield was slowly dying with each bullet it took for every spent second. Perfectly timing for when the shield would drop, Aion fast forwarded himself with a golden glow and reached for the soldier at the right-most corner of the group. The speed was too great to react to. He rammed against the soldier fast, and knocked him into a fence, breaking its fence posts. Preserving the momentum of the attack, he kicked another soldier standing close in his calves trampling him onto the floor and the moment his head hit the ground, Aion slammed the steel rod onto his face. Before Aion could get up, the next closest soldier aimed his rifle to fire. Aion instantly threw the steel rod, with a great force, to hit the rifle now aimed at him. Several bullets fired into the air as it drifted the aim away and the steel rod itself leaped into air from the bounce. He grabbed that man by the rifle he was refusing to let go, twisted him around, and using him as the cover, fired his rifle to hit one other man in the thigh. Instantly, after letting go of the rifle, he caught the falling steel rod and swung across the man's face, spinning himself with the swing.
By the time the four men were knocked onto the ground, Aion was standing wide open. The remaining three men and Valerie opened fire once again, and once again all the bullets froze in the stasis field Aion's stopwatch generated. Slowly marching forward with the shield, he tossed and caught the steel rod in his hand, stepping on the rifle the man who was shot in his thigh was trying to pick up, crushing his fingers.
The moment the stasis shield dissipated; Aion dodged out of the way and utilizing the time it took for the men to adjust their aim, he bashed one of the remaining men on the head with the steel rod and threw the rod to hit the man standing the farthest away on the shoulder. Instantly grabbing the rifle of the man collapsing onto the ground next to him, with the rifle's strap still around the man, Aion fired two bullets each onto the two remaining men, on their thighs.
Aion dashed to the man closest to him, who stood between him and Valerie, punched him twice with his fast-forwarded fist, that made the first punch appear like an illusion. Then, instantly grabbing the collapsing man as a body shield, Aion fired a pistol he just pulled out from the man's belt and fired it at Valerie's shoulder. Valerie, caught out of guard, lost balance from the bullet. Utilizing the split second of open window Aion fast-forwarded himself and delivered a kick that came faster than a speeding bullet,
Only to stop hitting the back of a forearm, harder than steel and immovable as a rock. Lightning flashed onto the ground with thunder, nullifying the force of the kick and blinding the entire neighborhood. Everyone panicked at the unexpected presence, and some retreated back into their homes as the sparks flew.
Valerie was conscious, but in shock, she had fallen on to the ground. Once the echo of the monstrous thunder settled, in the deafening silence, only Aion and Blackout were still standing, staring into each other's eyes.
'We could settle this, but your neighborhood won't survive that,' Blackout said in his monotonic voice. Aion was not about to give up and back out, he fearlessly stood his ground. If it devolves into a fight, let it be; the illusive forces of time against the might of deadly tempest.
'Stop!' one of the neighbors stepped forth in the only opportunity he saw. 'We'll pay for Mr. Denis. All of us! We'll pitch in and make the payment by the end of the day.'
'This is not over Theo,' Aion said, stepping down and finally looking away from Blackout's eyes. He slowly and steadily made his way back to his house passing the neighbor now standing at the front of the house. The neighbor quickly ran in the opportunity he saw, picked the old man hiding in a corner to his feet and made his way back to his own home, supporting the old man.
'I can't babysit,' Blackout said to Valerie, who was pressing the wound on her shoulder with her other palm. 'Get your guys up and let's go.'
Valerie climbed back on to her feet, and too embarrassed to speak she simply went past Blackout to attend to her men. Blackout's eyes, that followed Valerie, locked onto Aion, now stepping into his house, and his dreadlocks.
Time had changed everything, like laws of nature would dictate. Particles, energies and matter entropy and decay. Obeying the second law of thermodynamics, order gradually turns into chaos. Worlds shifted, moons changed, civilizations collapsed in the past few decades, but during all this chaos, those dreadlocks always braided themselves, and they always existed since the very first day. Single consistency in otherwise a completely different person.
'Ok, here's the drill,' Keeyoh, the dark-skinned kid of the gang announced. It had been five months since this kid saved little Theo from being trampled in the chaos at the train station. After the first couple of months sitting on a mattress in a corner wallowing in his sorrow and after three more months of adjusting to the new life, running small errands, this was his first work, out with the big boys.
The five kids of this ragtag team of rebels were standing in a garbage processing facility. All around them were heaps of garbage, neatly sorted into categories, separating the recyclable and the non-recyclable.
The group of kids were mostly older teenagers with two exceptions. Keeyoh, the leader of the gang, was slightly over twenty and Theo, their newcomer, was not yet a teenager. Keeyoh, even with his older age, blended right in with the rest, but Theo remained the odd duck.
'Neo, go for the cars; Tyrone, keep watch; Jie, the photonics, usual; I'll go check on the electronics and Theo, go for chips,' Keeyoh suggested.
'Got it,' some responded, but all headed off to their tasks, except little Theo. He stood confused, staring at Keeyoh for more directions. Keeyoh, having understood the difficulty, lowered himself to Theo's level and pulled out a small chip from his pants pocket.
'This here, Theo, is a Black Transfer Chip,' he showed the chip to Theo. 'When people don't want their transactions recorded or monitored by banks, they use these to transfer money. Usually, these transactions are done between bad people and these transactions, most of the time are in millions. Sometimes these people misplace these kinds of chips, and they end up here, in the trash. After the trash is sorted, these chips get sorted with unusable, heavy metal induced microchips, which are over there.'
Keeyoh pointed to a rather non-threatening pile of garbage at the corner of the yard. No matter how non-threatening it seemed though, at the same time it looked as if the pile's been made with needles.
'So, your job is to look for chips that look like this from that pile,' Keeyoh advised. Having now understood the assignment, Theo nodded.
Keeyoh with a smile, patted on Theo's head and retreated back to his own task. Theo hastened over to his pile, and being very careful not to miss any, he swept through thousands of microchips. He didn't want to disappoint his new friends, so he made sure to do a perfect job.
They were uninterruptedly at it for about an hour until one-by-one started assembling back at their original meeting point. In less than half an hour after that, they were all there.
One by one, the team shared their findings with each other. Neo had shown up with working spark plugs, alternator rotors, parts of fuel relays and hydrogen cell cartridges. Jie had returned with fiber mounts, qbit gate arrays, bi-gate capacitors and many more circuit parts. Keeyoh presented the group with resistors, transistors, gate and timer circuit chips, speakers and small unbroken displays.
'Where's Theo?' Jie asked, noticing the missing member.
'Here,' Theo spoke, now walking over to the group with a lot of black colored chips carried on his palm.
'What?' Neo couldn't believe what he was seeing. 'Those are all BTCs?'
Jie, pushing Neo to a side, hastened over to Theo and started examining the chips.
'Dude these are memory chips,' he replied, dropping the ones he picked up back to Theo's palms.
'I was worried for a second I'd have to kill all you guys,' Tyrone replied giggling. The rest joined in laughing, except for Keeyoh, who kept digging into the pile of black colored chips in Theo's hand.
'Holy shit!' Keeyoh without having to scavenge for long, pulled one chip out from the pile. 'We found one! Are you kidding me?'
'No way!' the rest surrounded him. Soon enough they all cheered and laughed hugging each other. Poor Theo got crushed by the enthusiastic energy, but he was glad to be a part of it.
Soon enough the gang, now carrying the scavenged trash in canvas bags, were standing outside a thrift store. Outside, at the doorsteps to the store was Keeyoh's bag which he had left behind into the store.
'Yeah,' when the door opened with Keeyoh stepping out, he was in a deep conversation, giggling with the shop owner. 'Anyway, thanks. Sorry about the broken card.'
Putting the chip and the card he carried in his hand back in his pocket, he picked up his bag. The others gathered around him expecting news.
'It's only a hundred dollars,' Keeyoh said with a disappointed expression.
'Aw, man,' the rest were disappointed by the news as well.
'I knew Ty's thousand is the best it's ever gonna get,' Jie replied.
'Yeah,' Keeyoh agreed in a disappointed tone. Then looking at little Theo, Keeyoh's disappointed mood shifted, and his face started to accompany a smile. Turning to Theo, he lowered himself again to Theo's level.
'We got a hundred dollars in the chip,' Keeyoh said to Theo. 'And since you found it, why don't we buy something you like?'
'Really?'
'Yeah, really.'
'Then I want chocolate cake! A really big one.'
'You got it.'
'Wait, are you serious?' Neo jumped into the conversation. 'Key, we can buy cod for a week with that.'
'We buy them anyway,' Keeyoh dismissed the concern.
'You can't be serious dude,' Jie jumped in as well. 'It's still a hundred dollars, you can't spend it on something stupid like this!'
'Come on, it's for Theo,' Keeyoh replied.
The rest remained silent, unable to comment on that reply other than with continuous facial expressions of 'no way you are serious'. Jie wanted to speak, but no words escaped his mouth.
'I'm out,' Tyrone said, starting to walk away from the group. 'Meet you guys in the crib.'
'I'm out too.'
'Yeah,' Neo was the last to leave, but before he left, he picked up Keeyoh's bag.
'We don't need those guys,' he smiled at Theo and patted him on the head. 'Let's get you a big chocolate cake.'
After the affirmation, it didn't take long for Theo to be pushing his nose into the glass of a shop, behind which there was cake on display.
'I want that one!' Theo pointed to a cake inside the shop and Keeyoh took note. Keeyoh almost stepped into the shop before he stopped for a second to think. He was lost, deep in thought looking at the chip in his hand for a few seconds before he made his choice and then his move.
'You know what?' Keeyoh addressed Theo, putting the chip back in his pocket. 'Stay here.'
As advised, after Keeyoh stepped into the shop, Theo waited outside fiddling with his fingers. He had no idea why he had to wait outside, but he had hundred percent faith in the process. There were multiple minutes of silence before it was broken with a grand entrance.
'THEO!' Keeyoh dashed out of the shop with a cardboard box in his hand. 'RUN!'
Without any further questions, quickly picking up speed, Theo joined Keeyoh's escape. Theo, surprisingly, could easily keep up with Keeyoh even with his tiny legs.
'Stop!' a man burst out through the shop's front door and yelled. 'Stop them!'
Hearing the wails of the man, a police drone that was patrolling nearby, locked onto the fugitives and started pursuing them. Theo and Keeyoh had no intentions of stopping, but the drone was slowly gaining on them, and Keeyoh was well aware of it.
'Theo, in here!' Keeyoh took a sharp left turn into a very narrow street between two buildings. Theo, almost trampling onto the floor attempting to make the same turn, barely landed on his feet, but detoured as requested.
The police drone was almost at the street by the time another drone responded to the call from close to the other end of the narrow street. With both of them approaching from either side, the two rug-rats were about to be trapped in the middle of the street. With sharp banking, the drone made a quick turn.
The two drones were looking at each other, now starting to slow down, seeing no one in the narrow street between them. There were no alternate routes connected to the narrow road either. Both the drones, now confused, processing back to see if they missed anything in their pursuit, slowly made their way closer to each other.
The search continued for a while, but there was nothing. The drones checked the dumpsters in the street, behind them, inside them, and found nothing. When there was absolutely nothing more for them to examine, they finally gave up after about five minutes and exited the narrow street.
Keeyoh let go of Theo's mouth that he had been holding shut. 'That was close.'
Keeyoh peeked out the window slowly checking the ladder for fire-exit, the dumpsters and now empty narrow street lying below them. Theo, sitting on the floor, had his eyes locked onto Keeyoh as they were for the past five minutes.
'Why did they chase you?' Theo asked, starting to unravel the puzzle for himself.
'Because I stole the cake.'
'Why did you steal it?'
'Well, sometimes Theo,' Keeyoh explained smiling, dipping his finger in the icing of the cake and having a taste. 'It's better to be the bad guy.'
When the situation settled and the two started to calm down, Keeyoh eyed the room they had practically broken into. That is when he saw the girl in the room, who he failed to notice earlier. She was terrified, but even more, she was confused. Holding a book in her hand, with round glasses in her eyes, she was too stunned to speak. Keeyoh, now coming to grasp the awkward reality of the situation, decided to calm the tension. 'Cake?'
They walked for an hour through the city streets looking for a place that didn't smell too bad or was not too disgusting to dine in peace. The walks in search of this place were fun for both Keeyoh and Theo as they wandered freely along the city streets. Finally, they ended up walking to the rich section of the city. All the buildings, that mostly sold designer clothes and the provided the highest of luxuries in the city were well maintained and so were the streets surrounding them. Small narrow streets between buildings were almost non-existent, but before long they found one street that would be the place for them to enjoy the cake.
Keeyoh rested the cake on a short ledge and took a seat next to it while Theo took a seat on the other side of it. Then they both dug in, getting the icing all over their hands, they snatched pieces off the cake and gulped them whole.
It was a glorious couple of minutes, slowly digging into the delicious cake and devouring it whole bit by bit. Keeyoh, after a couple of bites, stopped, sat back and took a deep breath of satisfaction. It wasn't the cake that made it satisfying, rather the elegant solution he concocted to make every party happy. His gang would be happy when he shows up with the unspent hundred bucks, which wasn't a certainty, but that which was a certainty was how the cake made little Theo so happy. Keeyoh needed no subtitles to decipher the level of happiness Theo had, being excited as he is, for the first time after the incident at the station. It was a huge milestone of success. One step closer to a happier world.
'Go away!' a policeman, who just entered Keeyoh's field of vision, yelled pushing away a very young mother. She was carrying her baby in her hand, but from the looks of it, she couldn't be older than twenty. She was thin, as thin as a person could get. Even the policeman's mild push was enough for her to lose balance.
'Please sir?' the mother implored. 'Anything you could spare?'
'Get the hell out of here before I have you arrested!' the police officer yelled. The young mother who realized that the policeman was a lost cause retreated into the narrow street with a broken heart and a crying baby. She looked up at Keeyoh with sorrowful eyes and went passing him deeper into the street. When Keeyoh turned to look at the police officer he was already staring back at him.
'What the hell are you lookin' at?' Keeyoh inquired the police officer.
'You better watch your mouth, you brat!' the police officer warned and seeing no retaliation from Keeyoh's side he went away.
Now Keeyoh's eyes locked into the poor mother, who had taken a seat on the same ledge, closer to the dead-end of the narrow street. She tried shushing her baby, but the baby would not cease. While rocking her baby with one hand she undid the left strap of her dress. She pulled the baby closer and started feeding the baby. When the baby settled in, it was a silence that took over that corner of the street. From where Keeyoh was sitting, her teary eyes were not clear, but it was clear that she was wiping them off with her right palm.
Keeyoh's mood shifted and eyes lost focus as he sank back into thought. Then he turned to Theo, now noticing how he was having a hard time finishing the rest of the cake himself. Keeyoh's stomach was growling, the icing he had had was not enough to satisfy his hunger.
'Theo,' Keeyoh raised his voice. 'Can I have the rest of the cake?'
Theo nodded, emphasizing his point with a nod and lips circled with icing.
Keeyoh with the permission granted, took the box of cake and stood up. After one more second in thought he, with the cake in hand, walked to the dead-end of the narrow street.
'Hey,' Keeyoh grabbed the young mother's attention, who, startled by his presence, quickly drove her hands to cover her exposed breast. 'We don't have much, but you can have this if you want.'
Without waiting for a reply, Keeyoh placed the cake next to the mother and walked away.
'Thank you,' the mother murmured, trying to make eye contact with Keeyoh, but too afraid to do so.
Keeyoh made his way back to Theo who stood puzzled by what he did.
'Come on, let's go,' Keeyoh replied with his usual smile.
Theo offered his little hand and Keeyoh took hold of it gently, now walking away from the street.
'You know Theo, sometimes it is better to be the bad guy,' Keeyoh added as they walked away. 'But always be the bad guy to do the right thing.'
Theo turned his head one last time to look at the young mother at the dead end of the corner, to see her taking a piece of cake from the box for the last time, before she faded out of vision.
'You guys go on,' Blackout said, stopping following the rest of the men. 'I'll be back.'
Valerie and the rest of the crew were slowly crawling away from the neighborhood. None of them had physical injuries anymore, thanks to nanite medications, but they were more humiliated than they could handle, thus crawling away. Most of the neighbors had walked out of their houses to examine the aftermath of the battle, now that it had settled, to discuss with each other how to proceed.
'Where are you going?' Valerie asked. Blackout did not reply, instead he returned silently back to the neighborhood. Valerie was in no condition to force the answer out of him, and at that point she didn't care what it might be hence escorting the rest of the men in black she continued moving away. 'Let's go.'
Without even a knock Blackout walked into Aion's house. When he walked in, Aion was sitting down on his couch, one hand running along its headrest and the other one massaging his forehead. He noticed Blackout walk in but didn't care.
Blackout, ignoring Aion sitting on the couch, walked to the refrigerator, opened it and pulled out two empty bottles. He rested both of them on the lower panel of an Edibles unit, pushed a couple of buttons that made beeps with each touch and the bottles started filling with a yellow bubbling beverage. Once the two bottles were filled to the brim, he picked both of them up, walked over to Aion handing one over, which he accepted, and sat on the couch facing him.
Both, at the same time, took sips of the drink.
'Still won't take Desmond's deal,' Aion said. 'If that's what you are wondering.'
Blackout shook his head taking a sip from his drink. 'Just wanted to say, to you and to Dr. Tyson, to stick to collections. I wouldn't want to be the one to get ordered to kill you.'
'And you'd do it?'
'If the bounty's big enough.'
Aion chuckled and took a sip.
'It's a little late to start saving, don't you think?' Aion asked. 'Should have thought about money when you were hunting trillionaires. I bet anyone of them would have paid you to not kill them.'
'A different man,' Blackout took a sip. 'A different time.'
Aion chuckled once again. 'Amen to that, sister.'
There was a silence as both of them took sips at the same time.
'I'm serious, Key,' Blackout replied. 'Stay out of Desmond's way. I wouldn't hesitate to pull the trigger if it comes to that.'
'Man, I really want to like you again,' Aion replied leaning forward, closer to Blackout. 'But you are making it excruciatingly hard for me.'
Blackout chuckled in derision, taking the last sip and resting the empty bottle on the table to his right. Then he got up to his feet slowly and headed to the door.
'What happened to you, Theo?' Aion inquired, still stationed on his couch.
Blackout, for the last time, before stepping out of the house, paused. Then he, almost instinctively, drew out his wrist to check the time. Behind the shattered crystal of the wrist watch, the second hand kept ticking away.
'Time, Key.'
The door closed behind Blackout and Aion was left to the darkness in the house. He sat back, took the stopwatch chained to his wrist on to his palm and chuckled. Taking his last sip of the drink he rested his head on the couch and closed his eyes, getting into deep thought. As the voices from the neighborhood slowly died out, fading away from his thoughts, he slowly sunk into a deep sleep, drifting away from the reality that was struggling to survive.