A Ballad of Wayward Spectres: Day 1

by William B Hill

CHAPTER VIII

  A clock downtown chimed ten P.M. as Alyson emerged from the darkness of alleys and side streets into the pallid glimmer of downtown. She tucked at the shoulder straps on her backpack to keep it tethered to her body, and blended into the flow of moviegoers departing cinemas, coffee shop glow, and the absent shine of streetlights. The scream of the Oct rushed in and out of earshot, causing electric flickers at the corners of the block. The effect continued down the street, and darkened store fronts and sidewalk corners. Alyson timed her pace, and strode as close to the road as she could, thinking that she’d rather die on the hood of a taxi cab than at a rapists hands in the alleys. Little had changed since she first walked these streets in solitude.

  The Oct rattled past again. All eight cabs sounded like they were about to lose their grip on the rails, and dump three or four dozen souls into hell from on high.

  Alyson checked her watch, and guessed that there wouldn’t be another train for at least ten minutes.

  She sat down at a table on the patio outside of Malatiero’s, an old European café, and opened her pack on the table. Glass and shattered plastic crashed against each other like melting ice, alarming a passing waiter.

  Startled, Alyson slid the bag away when he approached. His short blond hair was parted far to the left with a single lock slipped hanging over his eyes.

  “Good evening, ma’am, and welcome to Malatiero’s. Is there anything I can get for you?” he asked in a firm, deep voice.

  Alyson pulled the zipper of her jacket up to conceal the fact that she wasn’t dressed well enough to be there. She couldn’t leave now. She needed the time, and she needed to save face. She could spare some of her cash, but not much.

  “Do you have a menu?”

  He forced a smile, nodded, and stepped away. Alyson released an ocean-deep sigh, and pulled her bag open again. The zipper wouldn’t budge at one end. She groaned, ripped the bag open the rest of the way, and tried to corral the ocean of shrapnel inside the bag. She hated to think that she couldn’t keep it at this point. As absurd as she thought it might be, she figured that someone could identify her by it.

  She started the salvage by pulling out her computer. The entire body had cracked, and was falling apart as she drew it from the bag. She choked back a sob. The motherboard was split into three pieces, the monitor torn. She fidgeted with the hard drive mount, and yanked it out. It appeared to be intact. She stuffed it in her jacket pocket, and laid the broken mess of plastic in the chair next to her.

  She continued by tugging the backup power supply from the side of the bag. Tiny pieces of glass dripped from the sockets when she turned it over. She let it go and reached into the bottom of the bag.

  Alyson pulled her mobile from the wreckage. The screen was nonexistent, and the guts of the slender rectangle were exposed. She tossed it back into the bottom of the bag, and pushed the broken computer back in on top of it. She pushed the whole lot away, and laid her head on the table.

  “Here you go. Would you like to hear the specials?”

  Alyson rose and took the menu, keeping her eyes locked on the table. She blinked tears away, opened the menu, and searched for the beverage list.

  “Do you have any other teas than what are listed here? I was hoping that you might have a white tea available?” she said. “I will see what we have in the kitchen. I’ll be back in a minute,” he said.

  Alyson handed him the menu, and he disappeared into the restaurant again. She emptied the pockets of her jacket, leaving the hard drive behind, and surveyed her situation; her wallet held about $150.00 in cash, two of her own physical IDs, complete with codes from different times in her life, and a card for an old debit account. Last she’d looked there was only forty dollars in that account. She reached into the front pocket of her pack, and found that the old S6 mobile was still intact. She cursed the tiny chunk of plastic, and tossed it on the pile with the rest of her belongings.

  Her Marina Dekare shopping list was held down by the old mobile, flittering in the late night breeze. She cursed the killer beneath her breath as she watched the slip fly away.

  Alyson shook her head, and stuffed all of her stuff into different pockets in her jacket. There were no good solutions. All of her personal information would soon be compromised. Spending a single penny from her accounts would raise a signal for the police or the FBI to come down on her a second time. She wasn’t desperate enough to use the S6 mobile. That was a hell she had no interest in unearthing, and would likely result in prison all the same.

  Alyson reached down and stripped a rubber pad from each of her shoes. She’d thrown the biometric scanners at the hotel; their job was finished.

  She would have to settle on being herself for a little while.

  The waiter brought a cup of warm white tea, sat it before her, and offered a simple “let me know if you need anything else” before he walked away again.

  Alyson took a sip of the drink before adding a sugar packet, remembering that the synthetic teas always needed sweetening.

  It was all she could spare for herself that night. She took brief sips, and held onto the tiny mug as long as she could. Even if it wasn’t the best tea she’d ever had, it gave her time to take stock, and she whispered thanks for that alone.

  She left a ten dollar bill on the table; more than enough for the drink and a tip. She left her torn bag beneath her seat, but took the shattered mobile with her. Sentiment forbade her from burying the ruined thing.

  Eleven P.M. tolled, and downtown decayed. A few bars remained open, but those were temporary solutions. Alyson knew that they were just dangerous enough to be a problem. She wanted somewhere to sleep. She wanted solace.

  She counted solutions, plans, all made possible by the city’s stagnation. Houston ceased to expand after the Oct was completed. When the final corner of the grid went online, rapid vertical development dragged the wealthy skyward. What was once a sprawling metropolis reaching to every corner of the state was content to wrap itself around the four-by-four grid of steel track, and let the people adapt.

  The Oct was a fine solution to inner city transportation in its youth. Business thrived, and the woven streets of downtown bore a fresh facade. Most business owners moved their shops and restaurants to the peaks of towers, and gated communities found a new frontier on the fringes of heaven.

  Reality settled in. The technical limitations of the Oct forced the city to restructure. The infinity-loop at the core of the track drew more power than expected. As the grid was constructed and brought to life, more energy was leeched from the city power grid. Most of the track would be shut down from hour to hour to keep some trains on schedule.

  The inner loop, the infinite glowing trails of the Oct still shined over the center of the city, illuminating the specter of progress.

  Alyson stared at those electric tracks, thinking of another way to get to the top of the city than walking. Most of the pillar skyscrapers either locked for the night, bore intense security systems, or a heavily armed security staff. An Oct station was only two blocks ahead. She’d have to buy a boarding pass, which would mean registering her ID.

  She approached the neon blue edifice marking the entrance to the boarding station. Without realizing it, she’d buried her hand in her pocket, and searched for the little bit of cash she had.

  “No.”

  Alyson remained frozen in place, stilled by the sky blue glow of lights surrounding the Oct symbol, a sideways figure-eight with the right end of the second loop cut off with a plus-sign T on the end.

  She left the money in her pocket, and walked away. Last thing I want is to be picked up riding the damned train.

  Alyson set her sights on the horizon, a black line over artificial hills and valleys, and prayed that the morning brought answers. There wasn’t a bellhop on staff to escort her to a warm temporary residence. She prowled the streets alone, with no safe haven or savior in sight.

  William Hill has practiced his craft in the depths of space, in decaying c
ities, and just outside of the realm of the living. He studied at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, and has since worked on several projects, including a space opera series. You can find him in coffee shops and on the internet. In addition to his fiction work, he writes about video games and film at the PS Vitalog.

  www.psvitalog.com

  Follow him on Twitter @altwriter