✄❀ challenge 44

A flock of sparrows bunched together on the top of a tree shaped somewhat clumsily in their image. Cut out of some larger shrub was a smooth s-shape, wings folded, a small beak over a puffed chest. The tail end was a little bushy, it still had to be finished.

Ritz came out of S2 Florists, yawning a puffy white cloud into the chilly winter air. He was holding a long black and silver toolbox with black lacquer curled into the edges and corners. It was nearly the size of his old sport bag (which was probably still lying on the church floor), but much heavier. And sort of unwieldy. The stiff corset of bandages and scabs didn’t make lifting it any easier.

He set it on the ground in front of the store. The case was heavy and he could feel the tools shifting but it didn’t make more than a soft thump.

He drew out an arm’s length pair of shears from their dark foam and velvet bed. The case was more comfortable than anything he could afford for himself. After a few indulgent snaps in the air, he began slow work on Sparrow #2. Sparrow #1, the first hedge he had attempted to shape, had turned skeleton a little too fast. It was sitting in the alleyway waiting for the large garbage truck to run through.

He had to take off his gloves to cut with any sense of accuracy, but the winter air made his fingers numb. He intermittently stopped to tuck his hands into his sides. But it turned out to be a decent ritual, it gave him time to look over his work.

He had to trim the top of the tail a few inches. He jumped lightly onto the nearby dumpster (an ability he had only regained a week ago) and craned his neck before taking a single, careful snip.

“This one’s going well.”

Sal strolled out of the store and handed him a steaming cup of coffee. Ritz hopped down from the dumpster.

Ritz didn’t like coffee much, but he could use the warm hands. He snapped the shear blades together, tucked them under his arm. He accepted the cup it with a smile. Sal eyed the blades nervously.

“Careful with the jumping around, didn’t the doctors say to take it easy?”

“Yes. I am being careful.”

“Man, are you?”

Ritz conceded. ”And I have time.”

—

Ritz had ‘time’ because he was not going to make the next challenge. Sure, he had recuperated just enough to jump to a certain height, and jog short distances, but swinging, leaping from wall to wall, scaling a roof, keeping himself upright on a tightrope, those were out of the question. And being battered and stabbed – not even if he were being ambitious.

He had little fuel for ambition either. His sword was gone, now so was Val’s machete. The weather was cold, his ribs ached, and he had some topiaries to work on. Magnus had gifted him a box of tools appropriate for the task, and then some. Sickles, a new short square ended machete, several shears that moved smooth as butter, matching spades and what looked like a claw-ended fork.

Sure he could take a fork against Ran, he wasn’t completely unarmed. But the thought hardly filled him with reassurance. Coupled with his hindered legs, arms… everything and a stern talk from the doctors in both Phoenix Tower and the public hospital, he would not, absolutely could not make it to the challenge in a few days’ time.

Magnus was very concerned. Or maybe he was disappointed. He made a single appearance just before Ritz left the Phoenix Tower clinic but didn’t say much, choosing mostly the speak with the doctors. When he spoke it was like he was calculating Ritz’s worth as a result of the incident, not really expecting any response.

“Punctured lung, fractured ribs, severe blood loss…”

He looked up from the clipboard.

“You were out of it for two days.”

This was the first time anyone had given him a number of any substance. “What day is it now?”

“Ask the doctor. Listen to what he says for once. Get well soon.”

And that was all, the last part was obviously tacked on as a habit. But Magnus had not revoked his generous gift. Ritz was grateful too, but for a week he had been afraid to touch the tool box any more than he already had, in case it were to be taken back. Well, nobody ever said friendship was easy.

The Leader of the bike gang who had picked him up was a much more opinionated speaker. His name was Uriel. He or one of his cohorts checked in on Ritz in intervals that felt like every two hours. Every two hours a bike came roaring down the street by his apartment, or rolled up in front of S2. The visitor was frequently Uriel himself. He wore near-constant snarl and never seemed to have enough sleep, but was willing enough to ferry Ritz between work and home, and the hospital if he thought it was necessary.

Uriel was willing to talk day or night, but rarely had any compliments to give. He seemed to like Ritz, though, because Ritz did not seem to have the faculty to disagree. Ritz wasn’t sure he liked Uriel, though he knew he could flatten the scrawny bike rider in a fight. He wondered if Uriel worked for Magnus.

“That fruitcake?” He grumbled. “I wish I was on his payroll. Wish it was possible, without having to deal with the man himself but until then, no fucking thanks.”

He didn’t work for the church either.

“Not getting near that place with a ten foot pole. Would never know if I’m talking to a real preacher or one of the goon squad-”

But implying he was watching Ritz out of the kindness of his heart set him off worst of all.

“You think I have nothing better to do? You got Long waiting on you hand and knees, for-fucking-free, and you think everyone’s just gonna follow his lead? I got my own life to get to if only anyone – or a certain someone – would let me. Not you, but – UGH. And do you really think I ENJOY being seen in this clowncar piece of shit?”

And he would smack the dashboard.

That was his name for the bike with a sidecar. Uriel hated a lot of things, including this noisy black clown shit bike that Ritz saw him in every single time they met. He had no idea what Uriel’s idea of a better bike was until it came up. According to Uriel, there was an unbelievably more attractive bike at home in his garage. A real beauty.

“Don’t know if you’re into that kind of thing. If you have time, I can show it to you.”

“I have time.”

Uriel’s mood improved drastically that day. “Nice thing you’ve done with those hedges,” he complimented before speeding away.

The day Ritz saw Uriel’s “beautiful” bike, he also learned about his not-so-mysterious employer. His apartment was on the Eastern side, in a block of low-rise concrete squares with a plain grassy lawn in front to be shared between all occupants. When they pulled up in front of Uriel’s 3-floor building, Ritz saw Val sitting on the lawn, chewing and staring into space.

Uriel took his parking space at full speed and halted so abruptly Ritz almost flipped out of the sidecar.

“Watch your step.”

The garage was absolutely loaded with spare tyres, paint tools, unattached shells and motors and cans and canisters, a rusty oil drum and shelves that looked like they might collapse on contact. Inspecting the floor, it looked like some already had. Nobody else seemed to use the space, as Uriel’s collection junk overflowed from the wallside aggressively eating up space that might have fit a car. There was just enough ground for two bikes (and a sidecar.) Ritz carefully vaulted out into an empty space. Uriel, magically just as quick in his element, leaped out of his seat and straight towards a covered shape in the only other parking space.

“Alright man, get over here, take a look at this. Just a second… fucking zippers…”

Uriel had a number of toolboxes of his own, but they were all bright plastic greased brown with time and abuse. Ritz felt a sense of pride, but fell short of the momentous joy Uriel had in unveiling his real, rescued, proper beautiful bike to Ritz.

It essentially looked the same as the shit one but without a sidecar.

“What do you think?”

“Its… beautiful.”

Ritz nodded politely to a few of the things Uriel told him about the power and customization aspects of his favorite thing in the world. One of the only comprehendible facts was that it was faster, which was Ritz’s favorite part of riding in the motorcycle. He doubted Uriel would attach a sidecar to his beloved though, seeing as that was one of the parts he detested most about the clown bike. Another one of his favorite facts was that the back seat could stow a large load.

“Could probably fold a body in here,” Uriel said.

“How useful.”

Uriel outdid himself with his enthusiasm. He eventually stopped with a coughing fit. “Gonna go get a drink.”

“Okay. I’ll wait over there.”

“Sure, just a – oh.” Uriel spotted Val out on the lawn and let his voice dry up. He gave a curt wave and went to door in the garage wall nearly barricaded with his belongings and disappeared.

Ritz walked into the fading sunlight. Val was cross legged and slouching, looking just a little rougher than usual. He looked into the sky, ripped picked up a handful of grass and ate it. “Hi Val.”

“Evening, ninja guy. You looking at the apartment?”

“What?”

“The top apartment’s open, thought you’d be considering moving out of your er, budget housing. And moving up here. It looks boring, but it’s quiet, cheap enough, the food is… well, it could be worse. Mostly, I could use a neighbor who isn’t always slamming the garage door.”

“No. It’s far from work. Maybe later.” Ritz sat. The grass was slightly damp. “My last challenge didn’t go well.”

“I heard.” Val turned to him, still chewing. “I heard some of the talk. Got there late, but in time to snap you up, or get Uriel to, before you kicked the bucket. So I heard the end of it. You tried to talk her out of the whole thing.”

“Yes. It was a loss.”

“Mh. Did you mean it though? You’ll never go back?”

“I can’t, not in time for the next challenge.”

“That’s true. Hey, think about the future once you’re better. Maybe you’ll change your mind then.”

Ritz combed the grass with his fingers. “Do you think I should go back?”

“What do you want to do?”

“I hate that question.”

“Then if you really want to hear me… yeah, sure.” Val plunged another handful of grass into his mouth. “Try again. Can’t help you win if you don’t keep trying. That reminds me: sorry I haven’t been much help so far. I still intend to see you win in my- our lifetime.” Like Magnus, he said it all so levelly that Ritz wasn’t sure he was really sorry. But then Ritz wasn’t sure about much anymore.

They gazed at the streaks of red in the violet and red left by the sunset.

“I gave what you told her some thought,” Val said. “And what she said to you. I mean, I’m on your side and I understand it’s good to have someone there for you, but I can see how it’s hard for her to change. Human funerals don’t make the most sense… and maybe our death parties aren’t the best way to convince someone to join your world. But maybe she’d be more willing if you could live according to the Troupe’s rules in this… ‘new world’ as you called it? Does that sounds reasonable?”

“No.”

“Aw, just think about it…”

“It’s possible but I would rather die. I don’t remember everything about living with them. Most of it was school. We learned what was right and what was wrong, which was almost everything. But I don’t ever remember liking what I learned. If you did wrong, you were stabbed with knives until your stance was right. If you disgraced your elder at an assembly, you were also stabbed. So bring that to the new world and you get a bigger massacre. Actually, that’s what I thought about when I sparred with you. Your balance could use a cut to the-”

“Okay, so the rules for the kids were pretty bad.”

“Ordinary members too.”

”But who did the stabbing? How about the elders? Were they elderly? If that’s so, there’s no way they could keep up with the kids, they were just poking from a comfortable post. And oh, what rules are there for the Leader?”

Ritz frowned. “Everyone following the rules of the Leader, is that what you are asking?”

“If you could…”

“It is impossible. There can only be one Leader.”

“But…”

“If you were there on that night, then you know. That’s Ran. I don’t want to live in a world with more than one Ran.”

Val swallowed violently and faced Ritz. “What exactly is the ‘Leader’?”

Ritz frowned. “It’s… difficult.”

“I get it.”

“No…”

“I’ll tell you what I know, from videos of the Asahara Troupe show, but after last night I gotta say I can’t say I know much. The Leaders on shows were old guys, but that might not be a hard rule. They didn’t really engage in acrobatics and combat, but if Ran’s Leader, again I guess that’s not a rule. The acts they did were things like sword eating, fire eating, escapes from tanks and impalement. Small acts, but they did a hell of a job, I mean, I was convinced and I rewound the tapes over and over–”

Ritz’s brows furrowed as he stared into the dirt.

“Not in the shows, but in news clippings. You know the guy before the guy before Ran – the one who led the massacre, he hanged himself. Well the guy before him slit his own throat. And news further back is harder to pick up on, but the guy before him shot himself, or was it jumped off a building? Him or the one before him. Anyway, you see the pattern. Suicide, suicide, suicide… They all killed themselves.”

“Yes,” Ritz said. “The Leader can only die by their own will.”

“You don’t sound too shocked.”

“We were told every assembly.”

“I mean, not shocked considering Ran killed the last guy and expects you to off her. How does that make sense?”

“It’s her will that I do it. That’s why I have to do it. I have to kill her.”

Silence as he considered.

“Unless I can bend her will.”

“Huh. Make her change it to something like, ‘let me die of old age surrounded by new friends and loved ones’?”

“Yes, that’s it.” Ritz stood. “You said it just right. Okay, I’ve decided. I will go back for the next challenge.”

Val picked tiny plant roots from his front teeth.

“I will talk from the start this time. I haven’t been trained since childhood, but I have been learning to talk more and more. It makes sense that my performance has been getting bad, but she was surprised this time..”

Val rolled his eyes. “She’ll never know what hit her.”

The dismissal was clear in that line. Ritz glared at him. “If I die, or it takes 40 or 50 more challenges, I’ll do it. I can’t be worse than the last.” He jabbed himself in the wall of bandages coating his side. “If not maybe she will take a different approach too. Like not killing me.”

Val watched him, unimpressed with his wild gestures. “So you’ll walk in undefended.”

“I…”

“That’s brave. Magnus might spot you a sword if you haven’t pissed him off.”

“What happened to the one you took?”

Val shrugged brightly. “Broke it.”

Ritz’s jaw slid wide open and Val lay back in the grass, totally unaware.

“Do as you want. But remember what I said. I can imagine how hard it is for her to change. Especially now that she has the rules of the Leader. Hell, even I’d give up on humanity to be– crap. It’s Uriel. Uh, distract him, ask for him to drive you home.”

“I can walk.”

“He works for me. Make him do it.” Val sucked a final stalk of grass into his mouth, got to his feet and ran in the opposite direction.

Uriel was blustering at Val from the doorway to ‘get your disgusting shit out of the stairwell, it’s been three weeks.’

—

A long-awaited update on the city’s own terrifying serial dumper. Once again I turn to our reporter on the field. Bob, take it away.

Thanks Lia, here we see a growing crowd vying for a look at the aged pair of hands lying on a street between… Central and South. What we’re hearing and seeing is strangely touching, the hand came from two different bodies and are interlocked – holding hands. An unexpected sight, strangely romantic, it’s no surprise the cameras are out and snapping. And here come the cop cars so let’s quickly get them in the shot–

“Jesus.” Shel shuddered. “Cameras and vultures. Romantic, my ass, it’s a dead body. Ritz, change the channel on that thing.”

Ritz was more than happy to. He let the radio fall on a random station and out flowed the sound of bells and old violins over an announcement of Nonstop Christmas Hits.

“Jesus,” Sal laughed, walking in from the back door. “If I hear those songs again I’m gonna flip. Ritz, can you do me a favor and change-”

Shel interrupted with a thought. “Whoa, hey. If the other places are playing it maybe it’s a safe bet.”

“You might be onto something.” Sal snorted. “Safe bet I’m gonna kick your ass every morning I step in here. Ritz, change it.”

“Ritz, help!”

Ritz messed with the knobs while S2, in a one-sided headlock, argued about the merits of seasonal music on their business, which was in the last week, had been as slow as ever.

The door chimed and someone who definitely didn’t care entered.

Ritz gave a weak gargle. Before he knew it, he snapped up his toolbox and held it against him like a shield. He already had his shoulder against the read door.

Still in the doorway, the cool, hazy figure of Ran watched the continuing squabble. She spotted him instantly. Of course.

“Oh, welcome,” Shel gasped, untangling himself from Sal’s grip.

No. Don’t talk to her. Get back here. I have to say something.

“Sorry about that,” Sal said. “Looking for anything?”

We need to leave. She could kill any of us. Any second…

Shel and Sal both had time to examine their guest and both slowly turned to face Ritz. Ran spoke. Her voice seemed far away, like it was being delivered all the way from the Old Church. By aliens, in dream. Seeing her in the city certainly didn’t feel much aligned with reality.

“I just came to speak to him.”

She pointed at Ritz. He hurried forward, hurriedly pressing Shel and Sal behind him with his toolbox. Ran’s eyes shifted down at the surface of the casing then back at him, with something like a smile but not on a face he ever remembered seeing in the light.

“What are you doing here?” Ritz hissed.

“I am here having considered what you said during the last challenge.”

Ritz felt paralyzed, like he should not even breathe. Ran watched his reaction (or lack of it) and sighed. Then she flicked a quick look at S2 and backed up a little, rubbing her hands against her sides through the pockets of her threadbare black coat.

Nervous? Ran? Nervous about what? No way. She’s…

“It’s cold, but perhaps we could speak outside.”

“…”

Ran stepped out without taking a reply. Like a robot, Ritz followed, waving quickly at Shel and passing Sal his toolbox. It was a chilly, overcast morning. Ran was obviously underprepared and shivering. For the first time since becoming an adult he was aware she had also aged substantially. In every memory she towered over him, but in truth he was taller than her now, though he didn’t feel particularly powerful. Even in the dim gray light he could see wrinkles that he had never noticed before. He wondered what she did in the Old Church to keep warm and came up with nothing?

“Do you need a coat?”

“Excuse me?”

Ritz ran a hand through his hair. “Uh, maybe you’d like something to eat? Or we can go get you a coat. So we don’t have to stand… out… here.”

“Which do you want to do?”

“Whatever you need… whatever you think is best.”

Ran frowned. “Either. Again, which do you prefer?”

If it had been Val or maybe Shel, Ritz would have given them a gnawing or at least a filthy look for such a question. But with Ran he just had to avoid that step. Still in a daze, he nodded, stuck to looking at the pavement and started walking. Ran followed. Her footsteps were very quiet but every tap he caught made his heart skip a beat.

At a traffic light, he risked a look back, and saw something else that didn’t quite match his memory. The claw was gone. Ran’s hands, which she was attempting weakly to warm with her breath, were both normal, human hands.

—

S2’s favorite cafe was set up a few doors down from the laundromat, the line was always short and there was never a shortage of seats. As such, the prices were fair. All of the storefronts between the cafe and the laundromat were condemned.

Ritz seated Ran at the seat closest to the metal header, carefully, as if he were handling a bomb. “I’ll get you something. Uh. Just wait a moment.” He scampered to the counter. “I’ll have an orange tea. And uh… um…”

“Getting an extra today? Sal and Shel getting the usual too…?” The barista, who had an unintelligible name on her name tag beginning with Q, peered around his shoulder. “You with someone?”

“Sorry.”

“Must be my imagination.” Q turned her attention back to him, amused.

“Oh, uh you mean… her…”

“Her? The way you talk it could be your mom or your girlfriend.”

“What?”

“I kid, I kid. So, what else you getting?

Ritz fumbled wildly, dropped his wallet, and ended up getting her an orange tea too, and a few dry pastries. He slammed them down on the table. “T-try one of them.”

“What’s this?” she sniffed the tea suspiciously.

“Just tea. I like it. I mean, the guys at S2 don’t but maybe you’ll like it. I mean, we had tea at the school all the time.” Ritz hurried to drink his tea and burned his lips. “It’s a little different.”

Ran watched him and sipped her cup more cautiously. “Not so different that you’ve forgotten how to drink. I would hope.”

They sat in silence.

Since there was hardly a crowd waiting to order, Q ducked behind the bar and turned up the Christmas tunes.

Ran looked around for the source of the noise. “I heard this same song in two other houses. What is the meaning…?”

“I don’t know,” Ritz mumbled.

“This tea is not bad.”

He slurped down the rest of his tea and set down the cup. “I-if you’re willing to talk now, maybe you can explain what you are doing here.”

“I told you. I was thinking of what you said about this city. Life among the others. Lives built on respect regardless of strength. You’ll understand it was a shock to hear it from a child of our Society. One that I saw grow…” She frowned. ”I may have overreacted.”

“It was nothing.”

“Strange think for you to say. Do you know what happened to you?”

“Fracture… puncture… something like that. Someone wrote it down.”

Ran sampled a roll with raisins, and quickly put it down again. Ritz wanted to punch her, or leap out the window. He closed his eyes.

“But what I said. You believed me?”

“I believe that world exists? Yes. It was always there.”

“More that it… would be better to come to this side.”

“That? Not yet. I’m in still considering.” She slouched against the table, cradling the cup. “It’s not bad, not yet. To begin with, the food is better.”

“I’m glad.”

“Don’t get upset.”

‘I’m not.”

“I see. Are you smiling?”

Ritz pulled a grimace.

Ran sighed and combed a hand through her matted hair. “Don’t stop on my account. This is a situation where you may have to play the teacher. So have some confidence.”

“Yes.”

“Unconvincing. You were like this in the school too.”

“I know… I remember enough of that time…”

“Do you really?”

Before he could answer she finished her tea and faced him head on. He shrank into his jumpsuit like a mouse. “Again. I forget what I am here to do myself. Listen: whether you remember or not, set those memories aside. For now.”

“Okay.”

“You have time, I imagine….”

Words he’d said himself. But if Ran were here, here for good, on the good side, in the light… he had more time than he’d ever imagined. Hearing his words through her framed them as truth. The scope of having time was staggering.

Ran stifled a yawn. Her teeth were yellow. “I imagine you weren’t about to make our next challenge in your condition.”

Condition be damned, Ritz jumped to his feet with sparkling determination. “If you have time too, I’ll show you where I live. Or would you like to buy a coat? If it’s not too much. And I can show you my friends…”

“Stay focused,” Ran instructed.

“Of course.”

“Right. Then you tell me, where do you want to go?”

—

Ritz was considering the Church, but it was getting dark and Ran was visibly, though not audibly, uncomfortable in the ever lowering temperature. He took her to his usual provider, the Southern District Daily Pants, which was a bargain basement packed with shelves and hangers under a warehouse that contained boxes of even more stock.

Like the coffee shop, it was notoriously underappreciated. The shopkeepers seemed to avoid customers because they were not sure where anything was and didn’t want to have to deal with the massive staircase of boxes if someone wanted New Velvet Pants in Dark Red instead of Brown.

Ran followed him down the staircase apprehensively into the low-ceilinged vault where familiar holiday jingles were playing fuzzily over the intercom. The neon lightbulbs were buzzing nearly as loud.

Ritz immediately saw what he wanted, which was coincidentally on promotion (that always seemed to be the case.) Ran eyed it apprehensively when he held it up.

“It’s black.”

“Yes, it is.”

“You claimed not to live according to the Society’s rules anymore.”

“This isn’t like pointing knives at children. Plenty of people wear black. My friend has lots of people who work for him, and they all wear black.”

“A friend.”

“And all the bikers. You know… the guys on the noisy-” He made a truly horrible pantomime of what he thought riding a motorbike involved.

“But they make the choice, don’t they?”

“The priests, too.” Ritz lowered the jacket. “When there’s a funeral, they all wear black. You should see one.”

“A funeral…”

“When someone dies…”

“I know.”

“No, the Troupe never had any. You wouldn’t know. You have to see…”

“In that case, will there be one soon?”

“I don’t know.”

“Someone must die.”

“Someone with a lot of people who are willing…Okay. Whatever. It’s not about the color. We never had anything like this, even for outdoor practical class. Something warm, that won’t fall apart.”

Ran conceded that difference. She took the new jacket from him for inspection. It appeared to be made up of long, black plastic pillows which he thought looked very comfortable.

“The point of the uniform was not to give the students armor. The point of the costume was to not hinder performance.”

“But there are no students anymore. And the performances are over. They ended a long time ago.”

“You’ll have to tell me how you heard this story.”

“Later. We have time”

Ran regarded the pillow jacket with distaste. Ritz put his limp wristed fist down. “I’d rather not spend all that time in here, though. You have to get something. If you catch a cold then-”

“Don’t worry about me.” She put the jacket down. “I will look for something else.”

It was impossible to tell what time it was from the basement, but by the time they finished the sun had fully set and Ran was wrapped nearly up to her nose in winter-appropriate gear. The entire outfit was, of course, all black, and she had opted for a down jacket after all. It did look a little silly now that they were out in the streetlight. But she didn’t look silly enough for Ritz to open his mouth and comment on.

“Odd place,” she said. It came out slightly muffled.

“Why is it odd?”

“Selling so much. With no supervision.”

“They’re not even the biggest once. There’s a bigger warehouse on the Northern edge.” They stood puffing clouds of smoke into the air. “Where did the troupe- Society get their clothes?”

“Mh. Donations. But as I said, it’s important to supervise your clothing.”

“I understand.” Ritz thought he did. “Once, I had a neighbor who stole my socks every time I left them out to dry.”

“I imagine he needed a lesson to stop.”

“No…” Ritz eyed her strangely. “The school always said, inconveniences are brought on by oneself. Learn to avoid the sharp edges. Also, the landlord says my neighbor is his cousin and I should be understanding, and I’ll lose my house if I hit him. So I just use the dryer at the laundromat.”

Ran muttered something into the oversized collar of her jacket. Ritz tried to look over it.

“Your jacket is too big. Do you want to go back and get a different size?”

“Your lessons didn’t do you much good, I see…”

They headed back to the shopping district in relative silence. Ritz felt slightly more at ease when he saw moderate traffic, though the drivers were giving them nervous glances. At the next stoplight, he thought he’d play host again.

“It’s late. What do you want to eat?”

“I’m not hungry,” she muttered.

Ritz balled his fists and squeezed his eyes closed.

“Are you hungry?”

“A bit…”

“It would be a shame to go to bed hungry.”

It was a threat often used back at the school. Of course, Ritz was the only failure who ever experienced that punishment. At The Home after his escape, the mothers occasionally made the same suggestion, as a joke. They would never let him go hungry. People were kind.

Generally. He squeezed his fists tightly and turned.

“It’s a worse shame to waste money on food you won’t eat. I’ll take you to my house first, if you’re hungry we can see what’s around.”

—

Ritz’s house had no food and he knew it. No food other than pills and plants, of course. There was something awful and consistent about the place that put off his appetite whenever he hit the front steps.

There was vomit in the doorway of his apartment building once again, but whoever left it had considerately leaned a bit to the left before hurling so it wasn’t directly in the light of the lobby. Ran stared at it with empty eyes while Ritz held himself as high as possible and avoided all but initial eye contact.

Ran was quickly distracted by the disaster of lobby interior. Ritz felt a sense of pride. It was peaceful tonight, and someone had finally changed the flickering lightbulbs. He checked his mailbox, which never had anything in it, and waited for Ran to finish looking over the collapsed couch. A painting of fruit had fallen off the wall onto it. She turned to him.

“You live here?”

“Wha-No! I’m on the second floor.”

“Who lives on this floor?”

“Nobody. Or, everybody. This is a shared space.”

The elevator was broken. As far as Ritz knew, it had never been fixed. He led ran to the stuffy windowless hallway that was the indoor staircase.

“These steps are tiny.”

“I know.”

“I can barely fit my foot on one of them.”

Though she was shorter than he was, her feet were just as large. In similar sized boots, anyhow. They clomped up the staircase, chattering while at it, so then they reached the second floor Ritz was unsurprised to find one of his neighbors waiting for them.

“You ever think to keep it down? I have a hell of a headache, I should report this.”

“What time is it?” Ritz asked.

“Hell if I know.”

”Who’s this?”

Ran, or the pile of clothes that encased her, got a bit of a leer. She was giving such a straight glare back that Ritz commended his neighbor’s bravery and could barely stand to watch.

“Ugly little bitch, isn’t she?” the neighbor concluded. “Didn’t tell me your mom was in town.”

“She’s not my mom,” Ritz said dubiously.

“She just a friend then?”

“No…”

“Then it’s even worse than I thought!”

Ritz walked on by as his neighbor began to have a coughing fit and vomited loudly in front of the steps. When he reached his door, he realised he had been pulling at the end of Ran’s huge sleeve to hurry her along. Ridiculous, as if he were a toddler in a rush to show off something that would get him yelled at.

Well, telling her to go away would probably earn a worse punishment. He scrambled for his keys and unlocked the door as the rich steam of alcohol and stomach bile drifted their way.

“Good night!” he waved down the hall. “Asshole.”

“Night, dickhead.”

—

The first thing Ran noticed was the television. The screen was so small he might have been able to fit it into his toolbox. Ran was disappointed that it didn’t work.

“I can’t pay for it. Maybe I can pick up some free channels…” It wasn’t even plugged in.

But in a quick turn of events, Ritz introduced Ran to a shower, pointing out that it would be with hot water. The water temperature was less reliable than presence of the vomit on the front steps, but it was more than the school ever provided its students. Still clothed from nose to toe, Ran held her fingertips under the water with appreciation.

“Water was expensive.”

“Yes, I know. I’m paying for it.” He stepped out. “Take as long as you need. Um… but not too long. I’m always afraid the header will explode.”

“Will it?”

“I don’t know. I heard it happen in the city. But mine… hasn’t. Yet.”

They listened to the water heater’s gas whistle, getting higher and higher, as if today were the day. Ran’s eyes were like dinner plates. Ritz left her to it.

“Anyway. As long as you need.”

He stepped out, close the door, and shook with slight, silent laughter. It had been a long time since he’d gotten a feeling like that.

His laughter still beat out the rapid feeling of defeat that came from trying to evenly split the bed into two. He placed a pillow and the blanket on the ground for himself. He was still smiling a little as he attempted to tuck the sheets in properly around the mattress for the first time ever.

He tried to maintain composure, place things formally, like the maids at the Home or the deliverymen at the store. Look like you know what you’re doing. Even if you don’t. In those other cases, there was someone who knew what they were doing, Sal or the Mothers and Fathers. But Ritz was confused. Guests were not something he had ever expected. Cruelly he hoped that Ran wouldn’t know what proper hospitality was.

“You’re still a frugal sleeper.”

Ran had come out of the bathroom sopping wet but wrapped in her fully zipped pillow coat instead of a towel. Ritz leapt to attention but could only dig up one that was an unwashed yellow and suspiciously stained. Unsurprisingly, she refused, choosing the lay on the mattress like a long, moldy loaf of bread.

“That was pleasant. It’s warm out here too.”

“Uhh… are you…”

“I will dry in the air.”

“You have a coat on.”

Ran fumbled on the inside of the coat and Ritz averted his eyes. “I’ll wash a towel for you later. I, uh, go shower too. I’ll be out in a second.”

“As long as you want. I don’t think the box will really explode.”

“Yeah. I know- I was just…”

From inside the coat, Ran pulled out her old clothes and reached an arm out of the collar to place them in a pile beside the bed. Then after some digging around she pulled out an old square radio and set it on the windowsill. Ritz shook his head and headed into the bathroom. He almost slipped on the flooded tiles.

The door shut to the sound of Ran tinkering with the oversized dials. Over the drumming of the shower streams he thought he heard static. Quiet and soothing, as far from the nightmarish splutter in the Old Church’s depths, ranting about aliens and bodies. Something you could fall asleep to without having your head beaten in beforehand. But she had it working by the time he was done. His neighbor was in an absolute outrage behind the thin wall separating their apartments.

“You’re concerned,” Ran noted.

“Maybe.”

“You’re not afraid of the fool next door.”

“No. But the walls are made of paper.”

“Are they.”

“No, I mean…”

“I know what it means.”

Ritz sat on his pillow, rubbing his neck with the stained towel. “The walls are weak. I think he hit a hole in it before.”

“What did he hear?”

“I don’t know. I wasn’t even home.”

Satisfied with his proposal now, Ran snaked a pale arm out over her collar and lowered the volume. His neighbor soon replied, “Yeah, I fuckin’ thought so.”

“The walls are made of paper,” she mused. “I went to school to you know. ‘Outside’ school. I think it means something else.”

—

And before we close for the night, we have some breaking news tonight on the ongoing case of the body dumper. Bob? Any revelations?

Hey Lia, and I’m sad to say none whatsoever for our good police force but it seems like the dumper’s taking some time off too. Things have been quiet for the last week since the discovery of the lovers’ hands in the part that set off a great media stir. Some photographs have reached… several thousand likes on popular photo-sharing sites. We’ll be adding a few of our favorites to the website and if anyone has some of their own, please check in on—

Oh, yes. I’m looking at one now and it is quite the unexplainable phenomenon, isn’t it?

Sure is. Almost as much of a phenomenon as the dumper himself. What little we know of the victims is that they weren’t all related – but several of them were. In fact our sources at the lab say the hands belonged to -get this -two female relatives.

So much for romance!

So much for romance. Each of the remaining parts belongs to different people, of different families, so not much has been released on them – not much could, I imagine.

How about the head?

Yes part you’d think most easily identified, the head, has strangely also been slow on press releases. Of course, the image of the emaciated skull caked in concrete is rather disturbing, unlikely to garner willing viewers, and we can’t air the photo – so maybe it doesn’t come as a surprise. Though we hear the city database searchers may have a guess as to the identity of the victim, those results are locked up well within Long Corporation’s Northern Tower and I imagine they’ll want to be absolutely sure before making any announcements, so we may have to wait even longer. By then, the dumper may have struck again.

Do the police think that will happen?

Well, there is a theory…

It isn’t perfect, but it’s been evident enough that even guys on the street noticed: the dumpings tend to happen after moonless nights. This doesn’t necessarily mean the dumper is out on those nights, or that anyone is killed then and there. After all, the pieces were all clarified as long dead before removal, and thus before the dumping…

But it’s a theory that we have?

It is.

How chilling! Can we get a check – yes, we’re hearing now that the next night may indeed be… this Monday? This Monday. How exciting! But Bob, can our listeners do to stay safe?

Well there’s not much we can do. We can only hope things will stay quiet long enough for us to have some kind of breakthrough.

Could be that he’s got other business over the holidays, Bob.

Yes Lia, that is perfectly possible. The theories have been made that this is a family man out to let off some steam or a student with too much time on their hands. Owns a store that doesn’t get business at any other time of the year. So they might have been reunited with family, or friends, or work for the holidays. If you look at it like that, the killer  – I mean dumper – could be any one of us, the local cashier, your brother, the neighbor…

Me or you.

Indeed.

Certainly food for thought, Bob, sure is. Well, keep us posted on the story and everyone keep an ear out for updates tomorrow. Until then, stay warm and sleep sound, citizens…

—

A hair-raising scream pierced the night.

Ritz opened his eyes. He immediately yawned and rolled over but it was too late. He was wide awake and it would take far too long to get comfortable with just a pillow and quilt on the cracked tile floor.

He sat up, dug up his new alarm clock from between the plants on his shelf and struggled to catch enough light to read the time. 4 a.m. His usual waking hour. Another reason why he wasn’t tired.

Ran’s tiny radio was still crackling away. He hurried to switch it off. Why hadn’t he heard it sooner?

From behind it, he felt a cold draft. The window was raised, leaving just a small gap open. Most of it was blocked by flowerpots so he must not have noticed it. But as for what had opened it… they would have had to be very light footed. On one side was his dresser and plants, on the other, the icy, crusty balcony and fire escape.

Ritz shut the window and whispered, “Ran, did you hear anything open the–?”

Ran was not on the mattress.

He patted it down as if to make sure. She was not there. The surface was cold, so she had been gone a while. The bathroom was empty, the gas header safely turned off. Standing, he readjusted his bandages (trying to ignore the sound of a sticker being ripped underneath) and threw on the nearest shirt and a coat that smelled faintly of mold.

4 a.m. He had things to do at this time. He pulled a plastic bag out from under his sink and loaded up his belongings.

The air was cold, but it was not windy. When he exhaled, the small white cloud hung for a good few seconds. Frost was beginning to gather on the windows and corners. The clod of vomit on the stairs was frozen over. A few years ago he would have considered crushing it, but he knew better now.

Ritz took to the street lazily, yawning a purposeful plume of smoke. Things were still and quiet, not definitely not dead. A lamp flickered down the street. Someone had left their television on, others their loud heaters, even a few yellow lights. From some upper floor, a night owl (or another early riser) was having an audible phone call with a friend who must also have been awake.

There was always something alive if you looked for it.

Sometimes you didn’t have to look hard. Down the street, Ritz heard the approach of the road salting machines, their engines most definitely alive. More than they’d been all year.

He jogged up to meet it and waved as the large green vehicle with its grates and funnels shuddered by. He got no response from the driver, who had his head down in deep concentration. The machine trundled on, spreading its rocky layer of salt and grit, and nearly hit a lamppost but quickly veered back into lane. Ritz watched it with admiration.

When it disappeared shakily around a corner, Ritz spotted another watcher, hanging above him on the rooftop of the nearest building.

“Ran?”

“Oh, you’re here.”

“What are you doing?”

“Walking. Watching. Strange car. Was the driver sleeping?”

“No. You can’t drive while sleeping…”

“I know…”

Ritz squinted. She was hard to make out against the dark sky. Better visibility than in the old Church, but it still made him slightly uncomfortable. The bulging coat made even her vague image into a bloated monster.

Ran glanced down at the sound of a rattling. “What are you doing?”

He stood on a dumpster. “I’m coming up.”

She didn’t argue, but he was obviously having some trouble. One hand holding a plastic bag and bandaged under the arms, compared to his usual he looked a total incompetent. He was hanging lamely from an air conditioning platform when a strong pale arm swept down and yanked him up by his coat. He tumbled onto the roof somewhat shaken.

“Wh- You didn’t have to. I was going to-”

“Waste of time.”

He cut himself short but she did not seem to genuinely care. Instead, she moved past him and leaned on the chest-height wall. “Have you always had this view?”

Ritz glanced over his shoulder. His dim, concrete neighborhood interspersed with warehouses. In the distance, the tips of the red brick neighborhood where Len had lived, planned his revenges that never did and never would work out. And beyond that, the only thing that could be seen in the nighttime haze over the business district was the razor-thin outline of their local representative, the glass faced Phoenix Tower. He had to admit it did look pleasant at night, with its miniscule inner lights and the flow of reflections against its surface. It contained starry sky of its own.

Incidentally, there was not a star to be seen in the actual sky, though the moon was on full show.

“I’ve only lived around here since leaving the…” He bit his tongue.

“If I had known this was so close by, I would have explored the area sooner.”

“The moon is nice.”

“The moon… yes. I suppose it is. But that glass piece. It’s a building?”

“You’re looking at Phoenix Tower?” Ritz was excited. “My friend owns it. I was in there last, uh…”

Again, there was a guilty silence. Ran sight. “Child. I am sorry. About what happened at our last challenge.”

This made him even more uncomfortable. “I don’t care, now. Anyway, I was disappointing. I haven’t been able to do what you asked me to. I think I just forget more and more of your… their teachings as time goes on.”

“Would you have continued coming?”

Ritz fiddled with the ends of his scarf. “I was going to keep trying to talk to you. Stupid idea. Me and talking. When I was a kid they said I was retarded at school. Because I was bad so bad at talking. Even the ones who said it was a bad word. You know, the first man I saw, in a car, when I was ran from the Church said the same thing.”

“What?”

“‘Move it, you retard.’ I’m told it’s a bad word, but if that’s what I am, and it’s true, then I can use it.” He considered. “I know a lot of bad words. Saying them helps me get along with people, call them retard and they’ll usually leave. Or laugh. But… I still think it’s wrong sometimes.”

“And you preferred this world over ours.”

“Yes. But it was your world anyway… yours and the Leader, but not mine. Neither of them are mine. but fifty assholes is almost nothing out here. There are so many more who are kind, if I just leave the people I don’t like, I never have to see them again. In Society – the Troupe – I can’t get away. Fifty assholes would be everyone.”

“I must say I don’t know entirely what you mean.”

“It means…” Ritz sighed. “I told you. I wasn’t good at talking.”

They sat in silence. Wheels from a far off street screeched. The salt spreader had travelled fast.

“There’s a lot I don’t remember,” Ritz said.

“I know.”

“But sometimes I feel that what I do remember has helped me. It helped me like living out here. I can climb on the roofs-”

“Careful…”

“I can usually climb on the roofs and enjoy the view. I can cut ribbons faster than any other assistant. I can be the only one to catch a shooter before he kills a man who owns so many other people would don’t know how to protect him.”

“I see.”

Ritz was somewhat disappointed in her response. But the lack of insults he was catching for babbling was filling him with hope. And inspiration hit.

“I know. This man- my friend- he owns the Tower, right? He took me there a few times, and sometimes the doctors ask me to go back. I haven’t done it because… but I know they will let me in. So do you want to visit it? Maybe go inside?”

“You can go in that thing?”

“Yes, of course. It looks like it’s made of glass, but it is fine when you are in it.”

“Impossible.”

“It really feels safer than the church. The old and the new one,” he added quickly.

“And you can go anytime?”

“I think so. Even if not, you can stand by the door or from a roof nearby and see very far inside. They have some very uncomfortable chairs, and a coffee shop, and a hospital room with a lot of beds, and when you’re close the silver on the edges of all the windows look like roots or vines-”

Ran looked out at the unfamiliar structure in wonder.

“We can go now?”

Ritz’s smile faded a little. “We can. But I… I don’t think anyone is there at this time. We can stand outside… but I would rather we are able to go in. And…” He looked at the bag in his hand. Ran did too.

“What’s that?”

“I have duties that I set myself.”

“Well, you should attend to them.”

“Yeah. I have to. I’ve been putting it off too long.” Considering Ran had taken interest in his water heater, he brightened a little. “We can visit the tower tomorrow, but I there is somewhere else I’d like to show you. Somewhere close by.”

—

The 24-hour laundromat was sporting its usual twilight crowd of nobody. Ritz unloaded a mass of dirty clothes and a few bottles while Ran tottered around under the flourescent lights.

“What’s special about here?”

“This is where I wash clothes.”

“I see.”

“No, it’s not like the buckets at the school. Look at these machines.”

He gestured wildly and Ran went to sit cross legged on one of the machines  a few feet away.

Ritz threw his shirt in along with the rest and slammed the glass front door of a machine and sat back on one of the plastic benches. The water flowed in and the . They watched for all of two minutes. When it became clear that Ran was not impressed, Ritz slumped and muttered, “I thought it was fascinating when I first saw it.“

“You still do.”

“It’s calming.”

“I suppose it so.”

“Do you think so too? Looking into water… it helps me forget. But then I see the soap and my stuff, and I know I am getting work done too.”

“And you chose to do this work now.”

“It has to be at night. I came here once in the day and tried to take stitches out.”

“Out of what?”

“Out of myself. And I tried to make new ones and that’s when the owners told me to leave.”

Ran narrowed her eyes. “You should have told them otherwise.”

Stand up to them. Like I stand up to you? Impossible. “Stitches hurt. I shouldn’t have removed them and I should have tried to put them back. I didn’t feel like fighting… performing for them.” Ritz scratched under his bandages. They weren’t as wet as he would have expected, that was a good sign. “They didn’t ban me forever. But I don’t know how to face them if I had to… but I don’t. It’s better this way.”

“Why?”

“It’s quiet. And nobody will take my shirts or throw them on the ground because there are no free machines.”

The machine began its first hard cycle. Suds flew behind the glass panel. While Ritz stared into the tornado of clothing, Ran stared into him.

“This is how you live?”

“Hm…” he hummed noncommittally.

“I occasionally wonder what would have happened if you completed your schooling.”

“Yeah. I didn’t graduate at the public school either.”

Ran closed her eyes and looked pained for a moment. When she opened her eyes she did not look at him. “The training school. I often think. If you had passed, you would have been a monster.”

Another uncomfortable silence while the machine rattled.

“I- it’s good that I didn’t.”

“That’s right. But you wouldn’t have, not with all the time in the world. That’s why you had to get out of there.”

“If you say so. But public school wasn’t easy either.”

Ran nodded. “That’s true.”

“How would you know?”

“I attended one. Nearly all the elders, all the members did at one time. Which makes their school, and their teaching inexcusable.” She put her head against the wall and glanced at the rumbling washer. “It’s been so long since I’ve seen these machines. You need to dry too, right? You have time to listen.”

Ritz was tired. He was unarmed. He had no shirt and frost was gathering outside. So he sat and listened.

—

“It began in a city, far away from here. You’ve never seen the sea, have you? I’ve known you look enough to know you have not. But there’s a sea to cross between here and there. That far.

“You remember your teachings regarding guns, various mechanical weapons, the ones that have little to do with the user and are subsequently…. ugly in most hands. Do you believe it? That’s not important. What mattered was that the people in this huge city believed it. It was a beautiful message. This was how the Troupe truly began.

“In 19xx, the city’s Chief – do you know what that is?”

Ritz thought of Magnus Long and his all knowing files.

“I never knew him. Of course not, that was before my time. But the Chief was a lot like the city’s Leader – and that’s a lot of people. He had to be a great performer, and he was. He even had his own Troupe, though they did not call it that. Our first Leader, or the one we call the first Leader, was part of that troupe. They were loyal, they looked sharp, they were powerful, we assume. They looked good enough. We never thought anything of them or what they said.

Until they were all shot and killed by opposition. It was an ugly affair. There didn’t seem much reason. They went to see a show at a theater. The kind of old, hard outside – soft interior place you never see here. Few doors. A group invaded, locked the doors, and killed everyone inside. There was no escape. Sound familiar? The difference was, the police arrived quickly enough to attempt rescue. And nobody survived. Not even the shooters. How was that? I can’t answer.

In spite of being unarmed, our first Leader lasted until the end. She did not die until she chose to. Under a ray of light, red with blood and holes and meat of her fallen troupe, fingers cracked and slashed and bruised. She fought to the end to be seen on camera and to it she said ‘What an awful performance that was.’ And she fell too, but lightly, in a cloud of black smoke. She was graceful. But there was not a hint of pain.

“I don’t know, but I’d imagine there was a little pain. But this is how the story goes.

“The second Leader, or the first to some, depending on who you ask, was a man. He was older and was merely linked to the first spiritually. He began the performances, and the recruitment. After such an incident there became a major movement against the use of guns. There was also an interest in the last survivor as an emblem of peace and beauty, the battle as an art. And it was a show. The Leader wanted them to look good, so they took it upon themselves to develop a show. Elegant and practiced and still… dangerous enough to always remind of the bloody death of our First Leader.

“The shows became big. The Troupe had its big name, it had a cause that seemed very much with the times, so they were activists, both righteous and alluring. At the same time it still retained some mysticism, and when they emerged from their smoke they were surely a sight to behold. I regret not being able to perform with them in those days. But I was still able to learn from watching…

“At its peak, the Troupe was open to anyone new. They couldn’t fend off the interest. It started with classes. And when guests got a taste they decided to leave their homes and join the cause. The group expanded. But they were always together. They never put on more than a single group show, but that was enough… at that point, the money became a draw as well.

“I was finishing studies at a lower public school at the time my family joined in. We were not particularly well-to-do but we had our own house, a car and yes, a machine like this.”

She tapped the washer she was sitting on. Ritz chewed on this information. He wasn’t sure how he’d even get a washing machine in his apartment without his neighbor bursting all the veins in his head. And a car?

“I can drive.”

“Oh. One thing I do regret not learning. When did you get your license?”

“What for?”

Ran shook her head. “And you may also be glad to know I never did well at the public school either. There were far too many children to attempt to get along with. Too many whims to hold up to. So I didn’t, and became known as a brute. Do you know how many were in a class? How large were yours?”

“Ten…” Ritz struggled to remember his training school class attendance as well, but then, Ran didn’t need that answer. She smiled.

“It was twenty to fifty, out in the larger cities.”

“That sounds bad.”

“It was.”

“No, it sounds… impossible. I punched a guy in school because he kept crowding me.”

Ran nodded approval. “You imagine there being even more. I was like you. I wanted to leave. And the Troupe was the perfect escape. I learned to make use of. And nobody was afraid of anything else. And I couldn’t hurt them if I tried, only their children. But I wouldn’t turn a sword on a child…

“How they looked so good, became willing to fly, unafraid of falling onto their own blades or onto each other… it happened on occasion. But they kept going. Foreigners’ brains worked differently, that’s what the audience thought. But really, how? That was their secret. In fact, it’s something you can see too. You are one of them, or at least you were. Do you know what it was?”

“What what was?” Ritz was not happy being questioned.

Ran opened her mouth. But instead of words, a cloud of smoke emerged. It wasn’t cold, but that wasn’t a cloud of frozen breath. The smoke was dark and twisted against the fluorescent white of the laundromat.

“This smoke was their main sustenance. As performers they would never have survived without it. It gave them their strength and fearlessness. But it’s hard to explain, because unlike the other stories, this one was never spoken of. We simply took it, and when we did we forgot the question in the first place.”

The smoke dissipated.

“So the performers took the smoke from the Leader in the dark room and when they stepped out they were angels. They could fly. The Leader did not jump or fly, but when he performed it was like he felt no pain at all. That was my first job – his assistant. Blades down the throat, into the stomach, needles in the eyes and nails – but not a complaint. Because as Leader, as long as he will to live, he couldn’t die, as long as it was one of us putting the knives in. Strangely, I never saw a drop of blood. Just a lot of smoke. I wonder of the audience saw it too? They were always silence during that act.

“What a show. But so much for the indestructible body. The mad idiot hanged himself after destroying the Troupe.”

“Destroyed.” Ritz repeated. It didn’t sound right. After all… “This was still before my time. But the Troupe…”

“Yes, that’s right. Maybe I was the one who really destroyed it. Unless you think it isn’t gone yet. Regardless, you now what happened next.

“The world outside of here is too big to truly grasp. I could barely stand my classmates. But here we were, a bloated gang performing dangerous stunts on the influence of some strange smoke and delusions of invincibility and looking good and making money. Something had to give. And it was nothing of the performance itself but of our mantras.

“Even before the… training school was built, we had rituals. We sat and devoured smoke together and repeated our codes and vows – performance and art, to reach the end, never alone. It made no more sense to me than I believe it made to you. And we went from activists to a cult.

“To make matters worse, the new movements were threatening to take our secrets, after all we did for them, all the action we took against firearms and violence all those years ago. But those morals were old and out of style. And along with it went any style or beauty in our act. People came to see violence, maybe hope something would happen to us. The Leader was infuriated when he said this. I never found what the new style really was, or what it was to take our ‘secrets’. Take our smoke, maybe. I can see what use it would have outside. What happened next was a retaliation. To show it could never be used by others.

“Whatever you call it, he was the one who led the massacre. I suppose you know what you need to know of it. And I don’t know much more than you. I and my fellow assistants were told to go after the smaller ones in the front row. They were my age, so not quite children but not adults. This was the first performance I had away from the Leader. I found my task easy enough. I had been there the longest, practiced the most. Though the others… did not perform quite as delicately.”

“But why?” Ritz blurted. He felt stupid again, and the surroundings were not as safe as he’d like.

“Because the Leader told us to. Because of the smoke.”

“What did he think would happen afterward?”

“It made sense at the time. All he told us was to expect death. Easy for him, maybe, since he never had to fear it. We would be dying together, but not alone, and after you say it a few thousand times, maybe you begin to believe it. Dying at the hands of these monsters who were trying to take our

“The punishment would surely have been death. But there were children – like you – who were, they said, innocent. And coincidentally, that year, Long Corporation had set up a program-”

Ritz’s rubbed his eyes and wondered if he was hearing things now.”

“They set up a program that would spare us. Or kill us, depending on how you look at it. Again, it isn’t clear. But I am old, I may have spoken those mantras too many times to know for sure. I can tell you the old did not take kindly to being allowed to live. Then few were really put to death and they stopped. The trial took years, and money. They stopped being senior performers and started being the ‘elders’.

“There was only one person who really wanted to die. By then, low on our smoke and unable to perform, poor as beggars, we were ugly as sin and many wanted him dead too. So when we were sent here, he hanged himself. Right in the school. Not a drop of blood as usual. And we got a new Leader. This would be the one you knew, if you remember anything at all.”

“I really don’t.”

The washing machine was winding down.

“He started the school. The training school, in an attempt to bring us back to grace. But how could we? In truth, the school just made it worse, as I’m sure you’ll remember.”

“No. I remember some things. At the same time, there’s so much missing. More than the lessons and speeches.”

“Oh. I’m sorry. One of the arguments made against the smoke was that it had some… unwanted effects on children. Though trauma may also cause memory loss.”

“After I left the public school I found something strange.” Ritz rubbed his eyes. It was a thought that haunted him to some extent whenever he went digging into memories. “I can remember many faces from the public school. Not all friends, but a class of ten as well as the room and the teachers. When I think of the training school, I recall the room – light walls – and teachers, like you and the white elder. But the students…”

“You remember none.”

“Yeah.”

“They you are probably remember correctly.”

Ritz was confused. He started to argue but his throat dried up as the laundromat front door swung open. Outside he heard the pattering of a motor. Two leather-clad bikers swaggered in, toting matching cotton mesh hampers loaded with sheets and clothing. One looked as if he were going to get in Ritz’s face, but thought better of it, either due to Ran’s glare or the mess of bandages across his chest.

Ran remained silent while Ritz transferred his belongings to a dryer. He wondered if she was asleep. He stepped outside while the antsy bikers sorted their colors from their black-and-whites.

The sun was rising. A soft lemon-colored light was filling the sky and the glass edge of Phoenix Tower was gleaming, aiming a blinding blast of light to the East. Ran’s speeches weren’t completely unexpected. She had been a formidable lecturer at the training school. Ritz contemplated something she hadn’telaborated on – the Long Corporation sent the Asahara Troupe here. What ‘here’ was didn’t excite him so much as the thought that Long Corp existed in cities far away. Did they have a Magnus looking over everything too? A Chief, Ran had mentioned. But the Chief was shot. Ritz felt himself calming with the old reliable memory of stopping Len from shooting Magnus. But Val said Magnus was upset at him now, because he’d gone back to Ran, and now…

White smoke rose from his mouth and noise.

Ritz glanced inside to make sure nobody was looking and then breathed sharply into his hands. Nothing but white smoke. He puffed again, exhaled from the bottom of his lungs. He coughed and puffed but not once could be produce the black smoke. He wasn’t sure if he ever had. Or even if the smoke he’d seen minutes ago was real.

What had Ran said. It made them fearless? Graceful? Made an indestructible body?

He stopped trying, slightly red faced. If the smoke was real, it wasn’t going to be found in him.

—

There was a brief pitstop back at his flat where Ritz folded his clothes and Ran retrieved her radio.

The daytime sun warmed the road and with the salt, ice didn’t stand a chance. The neighborhood was happy to be up and about for the weekend and cars and bikes came screeching down both lanes with joyous abandon. Most likely out to spend time in the Central area or the Church grounds.

Ritz and Ran swerved around the clusters of passerby like sleek black eels. Ran looked upon the loudest, happiest strollers with confused distaste. Somehow, this was comforting. Ritz had dulled himself to it but it was reassuring to know how at least someone agreed. Luckily, they were headed elsewhere.

It was a long walk (shorter by rooftop) to the tower. But it was a short bus ride, and since they were to a work area on a non-work day, they were largely alone. Aside from the driver there were only a handful of older individuals, some asleep in spite of morning having just arrived. Ritz sat. Ran stayed standing, and eventually went to kneel on a seat to watch the tower and its neighbors roll into sight.

The crowds thinned around the business district around Phoenix Tower. It was a lonely sight, its glass panels dark with the sight of the buildings around it. Ritz made a mental note to leave at noon, before the sun began to sink and feed the glass with its vicious, street-burning sunset glare. But it was unlikely they would be there that long.

The meeting area where Magnus had almost been shot was well and truly empty.  Ritz took a peek behind the building, into the shaded alleyway and wall of opaque brick. Not even a hidden stack of chairs or awning poles.

It was a warning. The tower was locked up tight.

They stood dumbly at the main entrance. Ritz put his face up to the glass while Ran surveyed the flat, bare platform around them. The lobby inside was brightly lit by sun through the glass facade, and squinting he could see past the transparent inner walls all the way to the coffee shop, where the mounted TV’s screen was off. The elevator hall and staircases were barren. There was not even a receptionist.

“What is this?” Ran asked.

“I’m sorry. I thought there would be someone even though it’s a weekend.”

“No, what is all this?” she gestured at the empty pavilion.

“Oh. This is space is for meetings. And shows.”

“It sounds as though you’ve seen one.”

“Yes.” Ritz though. “I saw my friend do a talk. He made people laugh, but it wasn’t a performance like we would do.”

“What was he talking about?”

“I didn’t hear. I was standing up there…” He gestured up at the nearby building whose roof evaded all the cameras. Or would have. Looking up the Tower he saw a new, upper camera had been installed and was slowly panning over the old blind spot. “And he was down here.”

“You’re sure this person is your friend?”

Ritz was taken aback.

“We weren’t friends when it happened, but after it, yes. I think so. I saved his life.”

“You…” the nasty rhetorical question was held. Ritz remained confused.

“He was going to be shot, from up there, but I stopped the shooter. I remembered enough of our-your teaching. His hands were bad so the gun was slow, like you would say and then-”

“You killed the shooter.”

“Yeah.”

Ritz puffed a little with pride but deflated when Ran’s expression did not change. She wasn’t impressed, but seemed content enough. Not for the first time, they sat in silence. Only remembering now did Ritz recall the incredible amount of bird droppings lining that rooftop. That’s all the new camera would be seeing for the rest of its lifetime.

He strolled back to the thinly shaded doorway and looked into one of the cameras hanging above the control panel that would accept either a number or a keycard.

The cameras were like eyes without a face, and he was told to be wary of them, but here and now he had a vague idea of who they belonged to. He could avoid them but what if the owner was a friend? That gave them a very different use.

Ritz faced the camera for a full minute. Birds were chirping. Was anyone looking? He reached up, stretching skin under his bandages, but his hands couldn’t quite reach the fixture. He considered jumping.

“What are you doing?”

He turned to Ran. “That’s a camera.”

“I know. You shouldn’t stand in its view.”

“But I want him to see me.”

“Who?”

Ritz waved and as if convinced it would help, Ran gave a weak wave too.

“My friend owns these cameras. If he sees me maybe he’ll let me in.”

“Nothing is happening.”

Ritz thought. “I look like a lot of people from this city from far away.”

“Get closer. Or…” Ran looked up. Then she jumped. It was like a lifting taking off. She immediately fasted a light grip on the camera’s pedestal with one hand. With the other she reached towards the little white rectangle while the black eye continued staring quietly…

There was light crackle from the control panel. Ran paused as a voice untangled itself from the static.

“Sir, please don’t touch the cameras.”

“Ran is a lady,” Ritz objected.

“My apologies. Madam, please step down and leave it alone.”

“We weren’t going to take it anywhere. I just… can you open the door?”

“I could. What is your business?”

“I want to show my friend what the Tower is like. She hasn’t been here before, and I thought-”

“The Tower is closed to the public today.”

“Oh. Closed… Can I come in to see the doctor, then? The clinic said-”

His clever ploy was seen through immediately. “The doctors are not in today.”

“C-can you ask Mr. Long?”

“Mr. Long is very busy today. I’m afraid I can’t contact him immediately. However, if you have his cellphone, that might help.”

“Why would I have his cellphone?”

“I guess you wouldn’t, huh.” A noise came through that was either a chuckle or elaborate groan. “His phone number. If you had his phone number, you may call him yourself, and request that he contact Tower security. Then I can let you in.”

“Is there another way? He knows me, maybe you can ask him-”

“Yes, I know you too. You’re on record. Friend of Mr. Long’s, clinic patent and whatnot. But that doesn’t mean I can let you in. In fact I have strict orders not to under… these conditions.”

Ritz looked at his feet.

“Apologies again. Please leave. If you have a phone number, you can leave it…”

The rest of the message was cluttered with static. Ran hopped down from the canopy and put a hand on his shoulder. “People are cruel.”

“No, he said it nicely. It’s just bad luck.”

“Luck,” She repeated and took a glance back at the camera. “There’s time. Now I know where it is, I can come back myself.”

—

They stopped at yet another bakery, considerably pricier and with clean, glass-topped tables that didn’t have that reassuring tacky feel. The tables and chairs had black iron frames in the shape of coiling ivy. There were hanging baskets of ivy in front of the window too. The room was deserted save for an untalkative cashier who was not particularly encouraged by two unprofessional, grim faced guests.

Ritz didn’t realize the place was considerably more expensive than his local hangouts until he had already ordered. He had decided one a thankfully economical fruit tea while Ran, to his surprise, ordered a coffee, which was even cheaper.

“You like that stuff?”

“Believe it or not, I used to think I could not live without it. Habit from before we moved here, before the massacre. It was still a favorite of mine in the years alone in the Church while- I think you know.” She chugged it in a fashion Ritz did not think he could try without dying.

“Cold coffee is okay,” Ritz said, “But even cold it  makes my head feel weird. Like there’s too much to think about.”

“That’s why people drink it.”

Ritz admired how people could challenge themselves on a daily basis in such small ways.

The rest of their menu was considerably pricier, but there was something Ritz felt compelled to order. As soon as he saw it behind the counter he knew he had to show her. He tapped his feet with excitement while Ran tried to cool her coffee.

Their table received four hot dogs encased in doughy buns. He snapped one up.

“Look, I wanted to show you this.”

“It looks… delicious.”

”But if you look at the shape, it reminds me of you in your coat. Don’t you think so? Your new coat reminds me of bread, I was thinking that when I saw it.”

“And I’m a sausage.” Ran put down her cup calmly. “I always did worry about you.”

“I–Thank you.”

They both began on a bun.

“You know a lot of bread shops. Do you eat anything else? Such as… vegetables. Or fruit?”

“Cakes have fruit, sometimes. It’s all expensive. But there are markets. Why? Do you want some? I can find them.”

Ran locked her fingers around her cup. “I was more concerned with you eating well.”

Ritz snorted and she jumped in surprise at his indignity. “You sound like the mothers at the Home.”

“A home, you said?”

“Childrens’ Home. Place for kids without homes, I mean, without their real mothers and fathers but there were just… five of us, so most have parents. But it was a good place to me. They paid for everything. But the food…” he slew another bread roll. “The greatest wealth is health. Healthy body healthy mind. Um… garbage in garbage out.”

The look of confusion on Ran’s face would have been more satisfying if he could explain the meaning himself.

“They did not like when I left things on the plate – same as the troupe – but there was so much. I know, it sounds strange… to have too much.”

“Not at all.”

“But it wasn’t good food. And the apple had black parts. That’s not clean, right? It’s mold, I know what it looks like. Like the flakes on my wall and bed, you know.”

“What?”

Ritz busied himself with a third piece of bread. “But something I could always eat was the bread. I didn’t know there were so many different kinds. Are you going to finish that?”

“What about meat?”

“It’s even more expensive.” He thought. “But there was one place I didn’t have to pay. There was rice and beef, and long green vegetables and oily sauce, a little spicy. Or salty. It was like the troupe but… not the same.  My friend made it. But like always, there was too much. I don’t think he cared that I didn’t finish.”

“You have a lot of friends.”

“Ah, no, it was the same friend who owns the Tower.” He looked in the direction of Phoenix Tower wistfully. “I wonder what he’s doing. He’s interesting. You know, he has eyes all over the city. He might be busy helping look for the Dumper, I hear his name-”

“I would like to meet him sometime.”

Ritz didn’t want to make guarantees, especially about  Magnus, who seemed to live in a car. But there was someone who he imagined would be easier to catch.

—

“You have only been here once?”

“Yes. I came in a motorcycle. A clown side car.”

“I must commend your memory, then. And you are sure this is the correct place?”

It had to be, there was the block of three-floor apartments and Uriel’s junk-filled garage, albeit with the door shut. And there was no mistaking the mangled front lawn. The grass was patchier than it should have been, even with the impending winter. Val must have been stressed.

It was surely the place, but Val had neglected to say which apartment he lived in. Uriel’s building had three flats and they knocked on each of the doors in turn, but if any of them were the place, nobody was home.

Ran paced up and down the hallway while Ritz stared into the flat face of the first floor door.

“Your friends appear to be busy.”

“It’s the weekend.”

“That’s when people tend to do what they can’t do because of work. Buy what they need, visit family, spend time with their-” She stopped. “Rest and relax.”

“Did you do that on weekends?”

“Not since my family joined the Society. Our duties did not rest on traditional schedules, unfortunately. But when I was still in public school, in the city-”

There was a rumbling coming around a nearby street corner. Ritz hopped over and onto the rail, craning his neck over. “It’s Uriel.”

“You know these men on bikes?”

“Just this one.”

Ritz waved. Uriel pulled up in front of the garage. He was seated on his “beautiful” bike and now that he was finally seeing it driven, Ritz did have to admit it looked considerably sleeker than the one with the sidecar. Uriel looked like he could have used the sidecar, though. He had two black trash bags, stuffed and tied at the ends, slung over the back of his bike, barely leaving space for himself.

“Do you think he sees me?” Ritz asked, waving ever more frantically.

Ran regarded Uriel in silence.

Uriel could not have missed them. He stared up and them, then down at his handlebars. He mouthed something. And in a quick decision, he turned his wheels back towards the street and hit the gas.

The last of the exhaust and engine rumblings faded away into the general hum of air conditioners and the distance whine of police sirens. Ritz grasped for an excuse but couldn’t even form one to fool himself.

Ran didn’t need one. She zipped up her coat and stuffed her hands into the pockets. “It’s getting cold again. Is there anywhere you’d like to eat?”

“You can pick.”

Ran nodded. She glanced at the empty street again. “Think you can catch someone on a bike?”

“No. Not like this.” He rubbed his side. He hadn’t done anything particularly strenuous but his ribs ached. “Let’s walk back. You can get some batteries. And I think I need new bandages.”

—

Some oil-soaked rice and charred vegetable and meat of unknown species helped Ritz cheer up. They ate from foam boxes, using his dresser as a table. The entire place reeked of grease the minute the shells were open, and Ran commented how it made the place homey. The smell of rice was reassuring, even in such a form. The cockroaches in his flat were also enthusiastic.

“DO NOT FEED THEM,” Ran shouted.

“But there are so few of them, it’s just-”

“Do not argue.” Ran went to step on the scrambling roaches and retrieve any dropped food.

When Ritz went to clean up and change his bandages in the safety of the bathroom, he overheard the sound of Ran’s radio with its new batteries picking up static again. And again, it was somewhat comforting, like faraway rain. He inspected his chest and side in the mirror. His wounds were more or less healed.

While brushing his teeth, he spotted roach antennae in the drain. He quickly washed them down, hoping they could swim.

He was in a good mood, but as he walked out, and Ran began to properly tune the radio, he realized why static was such a comfort. Ran scrolled straight past the jaunty Christmas tunes, and the roaring crowd of what had to be a Big Sports Game. She was looking for something he didn’t want to hear.

The news stuttered its way into the speakers. The reports had never been particularly easy for him to understand, but there was no mistaking it, the Dumper had returned and it was bad.

—

It’s bad, Lia, very difficult news to take as the Body Part Dumper has struck again after a month-long hiatus. And this time it’s been a veritable storm of severed limbs, six new parts and counting, all discovered by civilians around the city in a matter of hours.

Horrific, Bob, I’m sure that’s the last thing one wants to stumble onto on a weekend so close to the holidays. Got any details on what was found?

Like I said, Lia, the pieces of popped up in a range of different locations and in such a short time, this suggests the Dumper most likely has a vehicle or – and this is just the theory on the street I’m hearing – and accomplice or two. Maybe both.

Chilling, Bob. Go on.

The body parts are in a similar condition, long dead and gray but with little rot, possibly because of the layer of cement dust or – or sand or something have kept it dry. There have been no distinctive markings, no reported signs of struggle or blood – of course there was the case of the sisters, or was it female cousins – holding hands at their death… But all in all, probably cut off after death. The cement suggests the bodies may have been encased in it prior to the, uh, removal but no uh, live dismemberments so speak.

Still, Bob, it’s unsettling news because we got confirmation that none of the found pieces came from the same person.

Who knows how many victims, desecrated corpses, hidden loved ones- could be in the Dumper’s stash?

Indeed, Bob, what do we have to go one?

Oh, my apologies. I forgot I’ve got a list of the morbid discoveries, at least what we know of them, so here, I’ll just cover them briefly for our viewers- er, listeners:

 

• From the East side of Central district, on a street corner like it was dropped from a turning vehicle, the morning commute discovered an unidentified body part roughy a foot long, and muscular, with various sinews loose. According to the passengers of the bus that nearly ran it over it could have been a part of a thigh. Not in particularly good condition, either, considering that most of the previous discoveries have been… mostly intact!

• Second up, later in the day was a torso toting an exposed ribcage, male, found in Central Church Park, course it wasn’t there to start with and the condition of the thing was a little rattled after being mistaken for an unwanted roasted bird from one of the picnickers, a bunch of kids kicked it around for a good ten minutes before the skin wore away and the game, so to say, was over.

• Also up in Central, and perhaps fitting with our little pattern of parts in bad condition, we got a head and man, this one did not get mistaken for a kids’ toy – ha ha – and nobody was about to touch it until the police arrived because, good lord. The head had been crushed by some massive force and appeared a crumpled mass of purple and brown, save for scrapings of white where the muscle had been worn down to the skull. THere were strips of… flesh? scraped off on the street around as if it had been dropped and rolled violently, but still not blood. Another post-mortem mutilation. It was posed face (approximately) up in a rain ditch close to the construction site the first discoveries were made, remember? Had to have been over a month ago. I’m sure police will take interest in this revisit.

 

On that note, construction in South District has been halted yet again for investigation.

 

• Moving down South, a little collection of hands was found scattered in and around a public dumpster with what seemed to be plant – floral? – matter. White flowers, or leaves.  Naturally, this load was uncovered by a resident of the nearby apartment complex. Maybe a better phrase is “stumbled upon?” According to residents, the dumpster was regularly overloaded so it’s hard to tell if the hands were left alongside the plants, or intentionally left in disarray or if someone had intended to place them in the dumpster more carefully. Whatever the reason, there were three hands, of similar skin tone and size, and perhaps there were more, but the load was ferried away by the police for further perusal.

• And just earlier tonight what we’re hearing over the radar is a foot or maybe an entire lower leg, sounds like it’s also in bad condition. Not dragged or dropped on pavement like a few others but what we’re hearing – rough edges? No, wait – sources are saying some sort of sharp wounds on the part itself, failed cuts maybe? An early experiment in the cutting process? We have yet to know, and of course the police have yet to make a statement on these new discoveries…

 

Well, Bob, this has been very informative. Has the police made any- what was that noise?

Speak of the devil, the police is headed somewhere. Could be another dumping. I’ll be in the car in a second and after them.

You do that, Bob, keep up updated…

“Ritz.”

Ritz was shaken from his extremely focused listening. What had really gotten to him was Ran using his name. The name on his ID.

“Ritz, what do you think of think of these…” She frowned in distaste. “These dumpings.”

“I can’t understand everything they say. It sounds bad.”

Ritz recalled the small, blurry white flowers in the grass when the first parts were discovered and photographed. Flowers from the Old Church. He tried to avoid eye contact.

“You have a theory, I expect.”

“I don’t know.”

“You thought it was me.”

“Maybe. Yes.” Ritz crinkled styrofoam between his fingers. “But you were with me all day. They may have found the parts long after they were left, but so many in one day? I don’t think they were left out that long. And you-”

“I didn’t have time.” Ran wasn’t smiling, but her mouth twitched just a little. “What if I did?”

“I can’t-”

“I may have left them during the night.”

These were the kind of lessons Ritz had always hated. “Just tell me, then. Did you kill these people? Did you leave the parts around town? Are you the dumper?”

“Don’t use that name, it sounds hideous. But the answer is no to that question at least. I’m not the… the one who’s been leaving the parts. Not exactly.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I did not leave the parts in the places they describe. But I am partially responsible for what happened – their being corpses. As you may have suspected, those are the bodies of our Troupe, broken up and scattered. But the bodies should never have left the church, and definitely not in that condition.”

Ritz felt slightly sick. The stench of grease was not helping. “Can I open a window?”

“You couldn’t run from this forever. When I saw you so absorbed in this… dumper… case I supposed it’s time you knew the answer to this, at least. Listen closely.”

But the radio was starting a fresh segment as Bob and his squad pulled up onto the latest crime scene. The room filled with the fuzzy howl of sirens and yelps from police and passerby alike to Fuck Off.

—

Oh man, Lia, there’s quite a crowd gathering here over. Everyone looks a little sick, a little nervous, but morbid curiosity is winning them all over – we’re all here to catch a glimpse of the city Dumper’s latest… work. It’s not really a victims is it? They could have been killed by anyone else – hell, even of natural causes. Which doesn’t mean much, it’s still a corpse, but maybe we don’t have to fear the dumper. Maybe the dumper’s just putting on a show. Well,  while I wax philosophical, the police have caught up and – ah! Hey, no pushing, watch the mic…

“The Leader you knew – or thought you did, I will explain shortly – took perhaps the worst of his predecessor and let it define him and in turn, the group he now led. He was perhaps a generation ahead of me, so not very old. Though you may remember him differently.

“After the massacre, the trial, and the entire Troupe’s subsequent exile, our numbers had diminished considerably and we weren’t about to recover through willing fans and advocates anymore. One Leader dead, and the majority of our strongest held back or executed, we weren’t capable of much of a show anymore. Not that we were legally able to organize them anymore. The Society was placed in a block of public housing. This was before Long’s time here, so this city was little more than districts of monitored suburb. There was little to do. Little to do outside of our houses, at any rate.

“Our isolation was a major offense. The new Leader appeared calm enough but past that there was an endless frustration. It was shared among the seniors who were allowed. Though as time passed, they simply became elders. They got old but did not hold any admirable power other than seniority. It’s surprising how quickly time passed.”

Okay, we’re hearing that two – no, three – parts have been found over in that – this alleyway that’s really crowding up right now, I’ll tell you that, Lia. So the parts were bagged up in a snap but our cameraman is saying he may have caught a few shots in the process, and we’ll have those up for you in a bit. Meanwhile, the police are questioning these, er, gentlemen who passerby are saying spotted the parts in the alley. Or was it, they were caught leaving the parts behind? Let’s see, several males in leather jackets and – yes – yes I see their bikes parked out on the street. And these men, witnesses, suspects, whoever they may be – don’t seem to keen on talking… here comes one now, get the mic up — sir, sir, can you tell us-

-Get that thing out of my face!

-Is it true that you were the one to call the police to the scene?

-Fuck off, get out of here asshole. What – are they taking my bike? God dammit, I need that thing for work! Clownshit piece of–

“They were all set to give the command for another massacre, or all out war on anyone who might pass. Only problem was, their army was mostly aging families and kids who would never see the shows that drew them into this mess in the first place. Parents that may still have had respect for the Leader were still not willing to put their children at risk. They wanted security, and quiet, and schools. They were safe enough from each other. It was quiet enough, save for the growing kids. So the last part of the equation was the schools. So the Leader had an idea, he started the training school.

“A perfect idea, in theory. The children would be educated and occupied for the day, in addition they would be learning in accordance to the Troupe’s beliefs, and become fledgling performers themselves. And they would have an audience. Parents loved it. And what child does not get some satisfaction out of being lent a real weapon? Or being instructed on how to fly…

“Enthusiasm returned for the Troupe’s aesthetic. For a while. True, the kids never killed each other. Maybe that was the problem. What do you remember of your lessons?”

Our photographer’s checking now, seems he caught the edge of a hand and… is that another head? Can’t see a face or anything but there’s strings of white hair. Looks white to me, could be the flash, so take it with a grain of salt. Our photographer will have to take these back to the lab and – goodness man, it looks like the bikers are kicking up a fuss at being told to go to the police station. They were present for more that one of these gruesome discoveries and it’s not off that the police might be smelling something fishy…

“Okay, if not the lessons, then what about the classroom?”

“You remember enough. Light walls, light floors. So you can see the blood. Because when you leaped just short, swung poorly, spoke out of turn – the instructors were waiting. Is that how you remember it? Good.”

“And what of the classmates? Don’t answer if you cannot. I’d be more surprised if you could. Because for the last four years of your schooling, you had no classmates.”

“The elders had in mind a war. But it would never come, who would bother coming all the way out here? Perhaps it was the lack of their favorite smoke that drove them insane. I would hate to think people who were like that all along ever had any bearing on the world, here or back in the big city.

“They wanted to create performers and soldiers who upheld strict codes of honor and beauty and would make a good and powerful story like our first Leader standing up to militant rebels in a theater. And all offense would be harshly corrected. You see a problem? Children aren’t good at upholding ideals of honor and beauty. They also can’t take many strikes with a blade as punishment.

“It was odd to see what was rewarded as a result of this absurd system. You had to be quiet, but speak impressively. You had to restrain all movement but strike faster and stronger than any other. You had to be able to ignore the terror of your classmates being gored before you and see in them what you could do to avoid the same fate. No point in remembering names.

“Many parents left. They fled. But many were loyal and, suffice to say, their children were worth less than their act. The classes dwindled. The assemblies were the worst. It’s no wonder you’ve tried not to remember them. The equivalent of examinations, you might think, they were implemented when the school realized they had no formal graduation ceremony. A performance on stage, corrected by a host of elders who saw no future in you no matter how well you did. Dozens were cut up and crippled on those days. Your name was far down the list, so you tended to go last. You were always a stone on the stage. By then the elders were tired enough to excuse you for not moving. We were both lucky, in some ways.”

Oh my god, what was that?

Damn. Get back! Get back! Stand back, everyone!

And the police are cordoning off another few meters, eager to keep everyone – wait a minute! Wait a minute! Do you see that? Listeners at home, it would seem there’s been another discovery, the Dumper has been busy tonight and – god!

“So all from your generation fled or were cut up on stage, so to speak. So were most of mine. For better or worse I was able to evade the school altogether. My experience, apparently, qualified me to sit among the elders and various other adult members, as well as run the classes – though you can imagine it was not a pleasant experience. I tended not to punish those younger than I was, and though the elders frequently complained, I did had a number of privileges that let me pass regardless. I wouldn’t get to punish my elders for a while, but it would happen through similar means. Seems the Leader had a significant soft spot for younger women. Discounting those with children, there were not many he would turn to.

“A dull, crass idiot. He made the final massacre easy.

“So the school was at the brink of the void, a single student left. That was you. There was no more call for teachers, but by then the members council – nothing left but devouts and old-timers – was unbearable so I tended to spend time in those light wood walls. I was not a particularly kind teacher in those final days, and for that I must apologize. You did well enough when motivated. But I still won’t apologize for what happened next. You need to remember, and realize now. It had to happen. It could be that I did not perform perfectly. Or even that I did not do the right thing. But if you believe it, then you must–”

God, they’re bringing it out now. Is that a – it is, a whole body! And piled on it, I can see some more of the lost arms and legs. Do they belong to – no, the body looks largely intact. I can see the legs hanging – oof, missing some skin off the back and — looks like a nub instead of a hand, so that’s missing too. Kind of a mess, you can see some strips hanging off, like they were ripped, not cut. Or maybe just ground against the ground or some sort of container. It’s early for theories, I know. But can you believe it! They’re covering it with a sheet now. Rest in peace. Hopefully this will help them uncover the mystery of where these bodies are coming from, identifying the victims, or at least one victim, and – ah, they’re blocking off the street.

Ritz sat quietly, feeling himself go cross eyed. He did not want to say that he had been trying not to listen to what Ran said but had a fear that that wasn’t going to pass.

“Anything to say? Any memories?”

“Uh…” Ritz mouthed.

Alright, we’re out on the main road, empty tonight save for the interested passerby, looks like most of them are leaving. And the bikers are heading out too – sir, can we have a moment of your time-

-Get out of the way before I run you over.

Alright, we’ll have to catch up with them at a later date. We’ll be standing by for more updates on this amazing – and, er, terrifying – discovery over here in South District. Market street, by the local florist and bakery. If you wanna drop by, we’re taking theories for our next segment –

They both stared into the face of the radio as if it had anything to display. Ritz crushed the wad of styrofoam in his hand and Ran slowly turned to him. He rubbed his eyes and bleated again:

“Can I open the window?”

“Yes. It’s your house.”

Ritz stumbled to the window, yanked it open, and inhaled the icy night air. His lungs stang with cold. Grease in his throat froze. He coughed. “I ate too much. I think I’m going to go for a run.”

“Where to?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“I’ll come with you.”

—

The temperature dropped yet again by the end of the weekend, but in spite of that and the Dumper’s latest escapades, the crowds were out in full force and determined to enjoy themselves.

Ritz had done a bit of thinking overnight, but not an impressive amount about the dumper or about Ran’s explanation of the school. It was really less food for thought than an explanation for things that had otherwise bothered him. So he didn’t remember any students, didn’t have any friends from the training school – because they were dead. Considering ‘what happened next’ as Ran called it, even if there had been one or two, they would have been dead anyway. Or maybe Ran would have spared them the second massacre. But there was no point in thinking about the past.

What bothered him was the short-term future. Specifically, where he was going to take her next. Ritz had been proud to show her around, introduce her to his normal, everyday routine, even play teacher for once. But as it turned out, not being particularly social or curious, he didn’t know much about the city at all. He had already exhausted his list of usual haunts, and unusual points of interest. To make matters worse, Ran had not been too amazed by any of them, save for Phoenix Tower, and it didn’t seem like he was getting in there on a non-work day.

But looking out the window, he saw the droves of people head off in their buses towards the Central area did bring something new to mind. The day was saved.

Ritz was having a sneezing fit in the bathroom.

“You weren’t dressed warmly enough last night,” Ran told him. “You may have caught a cold.”

“I’m fine. I’m like this a lot. It’s… pollen.”

“You work at a flower shop. You have flowers right here.”

“i know. It happens a lot.” He sneezed again. “I have something to show you today too. I want you to see the Church.”

“Church? I lived in one.”

“The big one, it’s different from the Old Church.”

“I can imagine. They are for meetings. The radio’s had a few ads about… winter sports and the like. They have hills? And a lake?”

“Probably. The walls are white. It’s like a castle, and when there’s a funeral, everyone wears black. Everyone, it’s like hundreds of people going to see just one, who isn’t even alive anymore. And they all gather in the front of the Church – and I don’t know how to tell you, it’s a really big place. There’s a whole park and what looks like a forest. And they have a big empty space set for graves, just six or ten right now-”

“You’re right. I’m sure I’m not imagining it correctly.”

“Then we should go. And there’s someone who works there, I know him. Maybe we’ll see…”

“Another friend of yours?”

The priest who broke the sword. Punched clear through it – it had been broken, but still. The mirror image. A friend, though?

“No. But if we see him, it will be funny. A pretty good joke.”

“I didn’t think you knew any jokes.”

“Maybe not that funny. Are you ready to go?”

“Why don’t you wear another coat?”

“I don’t own another coat.”

Ran made him wear two shirts. Combined with his heavy bandages, he felt armored. Ready to face the cold and the crowds. And with the bus line thinned out by the time they hit the street, he was feeling alright. Confident enough.

—

“I don’t get it.”

The grounds were completely devoid of visitors. Ritz was seeing the full scale of Central Church’s front lawn for the first time ever. Suffice to say he had not seen much of it on the day of the stranger’s funeral, and every time he had passed it since – in a bus or just on a walk – there had always been at least one or two people about. Plainclothes visitors or the black-coated staff. Today, there was neither.

A spectrum of colored glass sparkled above them, the luminous walls of the fortress-like building even more blinding. Ran stared up at the spectacle while Ritz padded around the frozen grass looking for some sort of sign.

“It really is impressive,” Ran commented. “You could fit two of our church into just one of those corner towers. How did this get funded?”

“I don’t know. They have a lot of members who-” he clammed shut.

“Yet there’s not a soul around today.”

Ritz reached the edge of the space designated for events. There was, as Ran had predicted, a small lake surrounded by a wooden fence. It went right up to the low stone wall that marked the start of the graveyard.

“Are you looking for something?”

“Is today Sunday?”

“Maybe. I’m not sure.”

Hoping he hadn’t wound up missing work, Ritz shook his head. Even if it was Monday after all, this was unusual. “There are always people here. I don’t get it. I can get so noisy on the weekends. You saw people headed here, didn’t you? On the buses, the ones that go by the apartment.”

“It’s cold. They could be indoors.”

Ritz bounded down the slight incline to the nearest window. The glass was unbelievably dense, and with the sun’s glare the view was utterly unhelpful. There were a few normal looking windows at the fifth or sixth storey level, but the walls were so flat he was sure not even Ran could make it up to see. He put his ear against a green panel and felt the frostbite almost instantly.

“They might not be in that room,” Ran mused. “In our church, the nave was closer to the back. Although… this building is a square, so it could be anywhere.”

“The what?”

“Stop putting your face on the windows! If you really want to see inside, just go in.”

Ritz was hesitant. He was even more hesitant when he reached the massive front doors. There was a sign made of three sheets of paper hanging on the front, reading ‘NO ENTRY.’ The doors may have been unlocked, but Ritz was not about to disobey the sign over some strange feeling. Ran watched him shift his weight around on the stairs.

“Are you like this every challenge?”

“This isn’t a challenge.”

“Then you should be fine.”

“I can’t. The sign says NO ENTRY.”

“I can read. But we may not even go in, just open it and check if everyone’s in there, and if so we can know why nobody’s out here.”

“What if they aren’t in there?”

Ran turned to him and stared down at him over the collar of her zipped-up coat. Angry clouds of breath rose as if it were a smokestack.

“You keep telling me these places have people. You are evidently looking for someone each time. The Tower, your friends’ house, and now this. But we never see anybody. You do think it’s strange, don’t you?”

“I did not make any of it up.”

“I believe you.”

“They must all be busy… a coincidence.”

“Wouldn’t you prefer this ‘coincidence’ ended?”

“If it’s a coincidence, doesn’t that mean I can decide when it happens or not…?” Head spinning, Ritz headed for the lake. Ran abandoned the door and followed.

“You may not enjoy this question, but were these people your good friends? You saw them often?, knew them from a long time ago?”

“No.” Ritz considered Magnus, Uriel and Val. And the one eyed priest and the Church. “I only met them this year.” And then Sal and Shel. “Most of them. I met most of them just this year. It started with Val, I think. Before him, nobody knew where I was going at night, why I sometimes had to be in hospital, why I had to be out running or carried a big sports bag even though I didn’t know any sports. Even if I wanted to tell them I didn’t know how, but he found out. Everything after that happened because I was trying to…” He shuffed away guiltily. “I was still trying to kill you.”

“Why did you trust this ‘Val’?”

“I didn’t. But he already knew when I met him.”

Ran paused and her eyes narrowed.

“Here’s another question I must ask: have you noticed anyone following you?”

“I don’t know why anybody would do that.”

“That wasn’t the question.”

“No. I never– there isn’t even anyone here!”

“Coincidences over a span of two days – aren’t you suspicious? It stands to reason that there’s a cause. Something has changed over the last week. You look to tell them about the change, but maybe they already know. You look for them in front of you but they’ve been watching from behind.”

Ritz resisted the impulse to look behind him. “What change?”

Ran was unarmed (as far as he knew) but her look carried daggers. He gulped. “I know. You came out of the Old Church. And I stopped wanting to kill you. It’s all over. But I just want to show them that there aren’t going to be anymore fights. Why would they be avoiding me?”

“Perhaps they are avoiding me.”

“Yeah, Val said he didn’t want to fight you, but… you weren’t going to hurt them.”

“How do you know that?”

“It’s not because you’re weak and they’re strong,” Ritz muttered, “But you have no reason to. They just wanted to help me do what you instructed me. Val said to do what I want. Magnus said all along that it should end without someone dying. And it’s true, this is the way it should end.”

“You believe this is over?”

Thick winter clouds parted, for a moment. “I want to believe it. It’s the ending I want. Isn’t it good for you too? As Leader, you can keep living as long as you want. I never understood why you wanted to die.”

Ran kicked frost from the grass. “These people proposed an ending that makes you happy. Of course you’d like to believe they’re your friends.”

“You don’t sound…”

“But having reached that end, does it not mean you no longer need them?”

“I’m not the one avoiding them. And I’d really like to still have them, in case…” Ritz looked over to the graveyard. “Do you mind if we go over there?”

Ran followed his gaze. “A graveyard.”

He was somewhat disappointed that she identified the strange stones immediately. “Yes. How did you know?”

“There was a lot of them that look like that, even in the outer cities. The Troupe were considered the odd ones, using the bodies for heat or resources. But I suppose that’s what you were taught. So, a grassy graveyard. Is that how you want to end up?”

Ritz was only too happy to lay out his three part plan, involving the talents of every one of his acquaintances for flowers, a plot, an assembly and speech. Funerals were about respect, he recited, and with all the space and all the people he knew were into such a thing, he felt it was respectful to him and them that he be buried. Somewhat selfishly, he added that it wouldn’t have to be a big affair, like the one he had seen, but a smaller, quieter ceremony that could be enjoyed and where everybody could hear him or herself think.

“You could come too, now, when it happens. I would like that.” He couldn’t quite imagine what Ran might do at a new world funeral, but looking out to the hill gave him a thought. Someone had to dig to hole. He didn’t feel like bringing up shovels at the moment, to her face, but it fit right into his picture. He smiled dimly. Ran’s face was blank.

“You look happy. Nobody should want to die.”

“I don’t want to, but I thought it was going to happen in a challenge. I guess it still will happen, eventually. Maybe we can all get old. Uriel already acts old. Uh, we are ageless, of course, so it may take longer…”

“And what happens if your friends die before you?”

“I don’t think that will happen.”  Ritz’s struggle to respond told the world he hadn’t considered that. “But I will do what I can. No revenge, just… quiet. I can’t make speeches or buy very much, but I can send flowers. I already do, it’s part of my job.”

“You’re a florist.”

“An assistant.”

Ritz rolled her hands in her pockets and gave him a long, tired look. “So this is the sort of thing you base your friendships on. How you catch each other after death. You must have been close.”

“You sound like you’re at a funeral already. We still have time.”

Ran headed back for the main road.

“Don’t you want to look at the graveyard?”

“I had a decent view already. I never… I’ve been enough of those in my lifetime. It’s not a bad place to end up, I suppose, if there’s space. I used to think it was the only way… until the Society.”

“I can try to have you buried here too,” Ritz broke in quickly, though he had no idea how he could do it. “You can ask too. They said there will be space for a long time.”

“But it would feel misplaced, to be buried away from the Society…”

That you killed?

“There’s space for them, too…” Ritz added sheepishly. They considered this. And he realized Ran’s silence wasn’t in embarrassment, she was expecting him to continue. Because…

“Ran, where… were are the bodies of the Society? I mean, I know I saw them die… somewhere, but I don’t remember where. And even if I did… I would have expected….”

Ran nodded. “So you finally ask it. That is a good question.”

“So what now?”

“It’s time I continue this history lesson. Come with me.”

Ritz wobbled after, while Ran continued to the street, frozen grass crunching beneath her boots. The noise was all consuming. Not a single bird of bug in earshot. Bodies? Were they going to see the bodies? He was no stranger to bodies, he’d knifed a few people in the day and he had stabbed Len through the brain but these were the images he’d been putting out of mind for years. Maybe later. He had time…

Ran didn’t stop as he rambled behind her. “Okay. No bodies today.”

‘Today’ didn’t settle him. “Can you just tell me where they are? I can try to ask for a someone to get them and they can be buried-”

Ran laughed, curt and dry. “If you’re trying to be respectful, it’s too late. Not your fault, though. But those are questions you’d best be asking the Dumper.”

—

They took the empty bus back to the Southern district. In a few hours, the glare off Phoenix Tower’s glass side would be at its worst. But Ritz was sooner unnerved by the street Ran was leading them to. A familiar place. He stopped just a block away and eyed the empty houses as if they were demons.

“I’m not going.”

Ran stood over the lane-dividing line on the road. There was no traffic.

“Don’t be afraid.”

“I told myself that a lot when I had to come here. It never worked.”

“I’m sorry.”

Ritz scraped his heel at the gravel. These roads were not popular enough to be salted. He kept his eyes down, but the shadow loomed directly ahead. And Ran was heading for it. Heading back into that abandoned street, into the shadows and flowers of the Old Church.

“Stop hanging your head, it’s unsightly.” She turned and softened her tone a notch. “We’re not headed for a fight. I just want to talk, and show you. Over here.”

A few meters short of the church, she turned to one of the plain, empty row houses, opened the front door, and went inside. Ritz followed hesitantly.

“You don’t have to step into this one.”

Ritz chose to accept this advice. He looked the entranceway up and down.

It was a plain foyer, with a small dining room/kitchen in sight, and the edge of a more generic living room. It smelled faintly of mold and rot. There was a couch in the living area and in the kitchen he saw some chairs in disarray, and a square table with a few bowls and a toppled box on it. By his feet were a pair of slippers, kicked to the corner of the doorframe against an umbrella rack with a number of ugly black sticks that didn’t really resemble umbrellas.  The house was abandoned, of course, but it was less empty than he had thought from the outside – like the inhabitants had just gotten up and left for work not long ago. Well, except for the amount of dust accumulated all around.

Ran stood just inside the doorway, and pulled one of the sticks, quickly but smoothly, from the umbrella stand. Metal slid out of its casing, rusted and bent. A sword, without a guard like Ritz’s old one, but otherwise identical, down the incredibly poor condition of the blade.

Dust fell like snow. “If you’re going to sneeze again, go outside.”

More advice that he took. Out he went, and Ran joined him on the sidewalk. The sword was gone. “You understand who all these houses belonged to?”

Ritz sneezed again.

“These were the houses belonging to the Troupe. You lived in one of them. You lived-”

“These houses are big. I can’t believe someone got two floors all to themselves.”

Ran stopped and probably came close to slapping him. “It was up to ten in a house. And they didn’t have the amenities you do, bakeries and laundromats. God. Okay, next one.”

“I think I remember, and they all look a lot alike.”

“We’re not going to another house.”

Ritz followed her a ways down and let his sneezing distract him from the ever present hovering form and mismatched doors of the Old Church as it passed them. The house they entered was one house away from being right across from the church. Its build was the same as any other on the street, but it had not housed an ordinary family. On the front windows he saw vines, or rather, sun bleached stickers in the shape of twirling vines, ivy leaves and stalks. There was also a cartoonish sticker in the shape of a thin crescent moon, and another of what looked like a large, round tent.

Behind the windows was bare walls.

Ritz circled the front of the house and entered the door Ran had opened. He stepped out again immediately.

“You have to come into this one.”

“Can we just talk outside?”

“Afterward. It will likely be the last chance you have to see this place.”

“I never wanted to see it at all.”

“I remember there was a time you enjoyed school. A short time.” Ran stood in the middle of the emptied classroom. “What made it bad was the people. But there’s nobody else here now.”

It was the lecture hall where they warmed up, learned theory and wrote and recited mottoes. A few of Ritz’s worst classes. It was the size of any first floor, but all the walls had been knocked down, creating one wide open space fit for dozens of children to be roughly observed in an efficient manner. But when the class is just one kid, everyone’s looking at you.

The walls were paneled with polymer tiles with the image of light wood grain printed on it. The floor was real wood, but blotchy. In most parts, it had been lightened with bleach. Within those parts were deep brown stains darker than the original tile. Might not even have come from the punishments. These floors were hell on your knees.

It was as he remembered, but somehow disappointing. More like a flimsy, weak representation of those memories. And that made him feel better. No threats, nothing to fear.  

“I always wondered. What’s upstairs?”

“Take a look. Then meet me in the practical hall.”

Ritz bounded lightly up the steps. He could have thundered up but he was almost expecting an elder to come bursting out telling him to shut up, you will be punished for your actions… The upper floor was creaky, and the walls had been left up. There were a large number of umbrella stands with swords in them, and a chalkboard at the end of the hallway. Several doors were locked.

Ritz went downstairs, then down to the cellar to the practical hall.

The stairs down were longer than they should have been, extended with a ladder.The cellar was also much deeper than legally permitted these days, the only light peeking in from the slim ground-level windows. The walls were adorned with various platforms and poles. In the corner, more umbrella stands. He tried removing a sword for himself. The blade snapped off at the hilt when he tugged it and he quickly put it back as best he could.

“Ran?”

“Yes?”

“Can we go?”

“You don’t want to try anything out?”

Ritz looked around the practical class chamber. The walls were flaking. The tightrope was sagging. The stage floorboards were rotted brown and blue. And they all looked so tiny, as if one of his boots would crush them for good.

“I don’t think I should.”

Quiet. And then a sigh. “You’re likely right.”

“It’s dangerous.”

“Okay. Meet me upstairs.”

Ritz looked up the ladder and the metal staircase, dead bulbs hanging up above. It had seemed so daunting in his memories. But now his only fear was that it would collapse and make a racket. He gasped the top of the ladder in a single hop and took the steps three at a time, crossed the classroom in six strides and waited outside.

Ran joined him and closed the door behind her. “Long will run these places down and set up better homes eventually.”

“Maybe I can move back. But..”

“Don’t worry. Nobody died in these houses.”

“I can see that. So where..?”

“Right, I hadn’t explained that yet.”

And that was that.

—

“It could have been the teaching that did it to me, having gone to a public school in the past. It could have been that the elders really were going mad, and the smoke was taking its toll on the entire troupe. Maybe it was the Leader. He was always the same, but maybe his madness just accumulated, past reason. Maybe you were the one. Seeing you alone onstage… in any case, it had to end. You understand that, right?

“I can say what I want about the Smoke and the Leader, they were the foundation of the Society -the Troupe, the Cult, whatever the name. But they were also its downfall.

“Sundays, early morning, every member of the cult entered the church to acquire the smoke for the week. The new Leader was stingy, it did not fill the room like the old days but it was enough to numb the peoples’ pain and worry, for a while. And while it made our people fearless and powerful, it did not make them invincible. So, to put it more bluntly, all it did was make them stupid. This was the perfect time to kill them. A fitting end, too.

“The group sat and the doors were locked. Didn’t want any outsiders helping themselves to some precious smoke. I started to burn the Leader’s plants, and release the smoke. The pleasant chatter started. It was just the sound that was pleasant, the words were about how much we were hated and how hard we would strike back. The fog started building at the ceiling, sinking down as it filled the room. Eventually, their heads in the clouds, the talking stopped.

“I was seated next to the Leader seat. He was not present that day, hadn’t been for weeks. We had a number of favored women nearby on my side, most of them older. The elders were at the other end of the table. They were close enough.

“The women beside me were always underdressed. True, the heating was bizarre and they never had much reason stand out in cold weather. But do you know why you have this? The black scarf. It’s long enough to cover your face, isn’t it. Keep you from breathing smoke just long enough to accomplish a goal.

“It was hard to sneak in any tools. The Troupe had dwindled but there was no way a single cheap blade would handle them all. So I improvised. Construction sites were common and they had all sorts of things, including what I needed. Though I suppose I wasn’t the first to think of it. Our old Leader had the idea first.

“String on a neck. To be more specific, it was wire. Not instant, but so versatile. Hook it around another strand and you can catch two or three at once without standing near them. Pull a loop and the door is blocked by a near-invisible line at face or neck height. Hidden in that disgusting cloud of smoke, it may as well have been magic. And saturated with smoke they were so compliant. Very quiet, too. More spittle than blood.

“There went the Troupe, lifted headfirst into the cloud with just the legs hanging out until they fell down limp. I circled the place twice to make sure the elders were dead when I returned to my seat. Elderly big talkers, but pathetic. Some actually snapped their necks. The second round I opened the door for you. I think I suspected what would happen by then and I would need you out.

“That’s just it. I was not thinking excessively of you, then. It was the Leader who would make the finishing blow. On that day, he was not with us, he was locked in he attic. Do you remember little about him? I locked him there after a particularly rude invitation, and nobody ever found him. When I said he was tired, they believed me, because I was a favorite. Perhaps they thought more than favorite. In any case, he posed a challenge to my plans. Before him, I had only loosely believed our mantra ‘the Leader only dies by his own hand,’ maybe as a metaphor. But for all the insanity of the cult, that part is right. Believe me. I wanted him dead.

“It wasn’t going to happen there, though. Hanging, strangulation – they weren’t going to work. I had tried before. But he had time. He didn’t shed a tear when I told him what happened. I left him locked while I attend to the bodies.

“What else was there to do but put them to use? I stowed them safely away over the course of  a week in a place they would be helpful, as they were taught to be. I ate from their houses and collected what I needed from the same, or the nearby construction sites. Nobody missed them. Well, I can’t speak for you. Or the Leader.

“He remained a problem. He attempted escape exactly four times after the massacre, he knew nobody would ‘eventually find him if he waited’ as he often bragged. But our leaders were never acrobats. The first time I let it slide. The following, I was to be busy during the day, so I composed a new punishment. One limb off each time. He didn’t need those to live, they came off easily. He was a one-armed snake and nothing more by the time we were complete.

“His death happened soon after his final punishment. I gave him the blade I used to cut off his remaining leg and told him – do as your predecessor. Eat it. And he did. Slit his own throat. Barely even managed it. There was just a little splatter of blood. I put him with the others and was ready to leave.

“I should have. But some unexplainable reason – the same kind that led to your escape – kept me in that place. I thought, their bodies are being put to use but there’s nobody to appreciate them if I don’t stay. Or maybe I thought I needed the smoke, or just…

“A month later, or more, the worst storm season in ten years hit the town. The roof collapsed over my head as I slept. I was crushed. My bones caved, my head should have too but I was hardly aware. So I went back to sleep. But it shouldn’t have just been sleep. I should have died, but most definitely did not want to. So, you can see, I didn’t. I just saw clouds of black and awoke pushing out of the remains. What that meant: I was the new Leader. And now I couldn’t leave. Funny how things work out.”

“Is that a joke?” Ritz asked hoarsely.

She might have been smiling under that enormous collar.

Ritz slumped his shoulders. “You stayed with the bodies, and a roof collapsed on you.”

“Where the walls were not fortified, yes.”

“These houses,’ Ritz swept his arm around them. “Their roofs are all fine.”

“They were not such ambitious projects. Their construction was not rushed.”

They both purposefully kept their faces pointed away from the Old, half-collapsed, overgrown Church. Ritz wiped his nose on his sleeve and Ran glared at him distastefully. He sniffed, “So where are the bodies?”

“You already know.”

“I don’t. That’s why I’m asking.”

“I put them to use. I told you. Use your head. The dumper did. He keeps uncovering them and… taking them, for some unknown reason. Unknown, even to me. I watch them all day and all night and yet, someone…” Her frown deepened its lines on her forehead. “I ask you again. On your challenges, are you sure you aren’t followed?”

“I know I’m not followed…”

“But someone is using you, or us. Nobody else knows where the bodies are. Use your head.”

Ritz was not in the mood. “I don’t know either. Why would anyone want to do that? Man,” he said, “I’m glad I don’t have to fight you anymore.”

“It is a small mercy.”

They contemplated challenges of the past and present. Ran’s stomach grumbled and Ritz choked back an embarrassing giggle. “What do you want to eat tonight? I wouldn’t mind getting the same thing again,” he quickly added. “We can look for other things too, but there’s lots of time to find new places later. Lots of time.”

“Hm.” Ran looked over the houses one last time. “Are you sure you don’t want to see more?”

“No.”

“You don’t know anybody who may be interested?”

“If you say that.. I might bring my friends back to see it. If that’s okay with you.”

Ran didn’t answer. In the distance, traffic screeched. Phoenix Tower was in full blinding red bloom as the sun began to set.

—

Ran sat cross legged and chewed on some unpleasant soup they had decided to sample at the takeout shop. She was more subdued than expected. Ritz thought this over while he attempted to find a spare electric socket for his television. Was she upset that he didn’t care about the Troupe’s history? Why would he want to think about it? She seemed well aware that no aspect of it had been particularly pleasant and knowing those dangling legs and disappearing heads from his ancient memories were actually hangings provided zero comfort.

Plus, she had taken no interest in any of the things he had tried to show her.

Failing to find an untaken socket, he stopped his mission and sighed.

“I have to buy a longer power wire or something for this. Next week.” He threw down the chord beside the dead TV. “Don’t even know if this works.”

“Not worth getting frustrated.”

“Yeah. I’m going to sleep early tonight.”

“Okay.”

“Tomorrow is Monday, I have work.”

“At the flower place, I know.”

Ritz rolled the blanket out beside the pillow. He and Ran had decided that with her down blanket of a coat, she only needed the mattress and Ritz took the rest of the bed to his corner of the floor. With the extra padding, his sides didn’t ache. But they may have simply healed up. He turned off the lamp (which was occupying one of the only wall sockets) and lay back, wide awake.

Ran dug her radio from the depths of her coat. It was already set to the news channel when it switched on.

AND GOD! THE SMELL! TRULY A GROTESQUE SIGHT WE HAVE HERE, THE DUMPER HAS OUTDONE HIMSELF TONIGHT, TO HELL WITH HIM BEING A FAMILY HOLIDAY MAN, CLEARLY THIS IS ONE WITH NO OTHER OCCUPATIONS BUT A SICK-

“Ran.”

“I’ll keep the noise low.”

“Not that. The du- the one breaking the bodies. The Troupe’s bodies and… dumping them.” The subject was a verbal minefield, almost not worth it. “Why would anyone want to do that?”

“I don’t know. When I came to meet you, I was hoping you would know.”

“I don’t. I didn’t even know where the parts came from. I only saw them once on the news, but the pictures were all blurry. I saw the flowers and thought it was you, but even then… I didn’t really believe it.”

“How kind of you.” Ran exhaled loudly and slumped nose-deep into her coat. “As for why, I can’t be sure. I know no more than you, but I can guess why based on the Troupe’s reputation. Simple anger. The final act made many enemies. Could have some enemies from even before the incident. The Troupe was political, and there are always enemies there. Someone’s friend or family taken by the group. Or killed by them, the first massacre. Or maybe on your behalf.”

“What?”

“The dumpings only started happening this fall. Again, it’s hard to be sure, but you said this was the time you started meeting… friends… who were interested in your case.”

“You don’t think they did anything, did you?”

“I said, I wasn’t sure. These people seem to mean something to you. Though I’ve never met them… I hope for their sake none of them is the the offender.”

“Yeah…” Ritz stared at his blotchy ceiling. Was that a roach in the corner? Did roaches climb walls? “Wait, you say you knew the body parts were from the Troupe, did you see them on TV?”

“No, I noticed they were missing from the source. I was in the church to watch them, of course I noticed. Mutilations corresponding to the radio news, and I knew. And there was the night I nearly caught the thief…”

“Nearly? Someone escaped? From you? You didn’t see who it was either?”

“I believe they escaped in a vehicle. I am not as fast as you believe. I am also not all-seeing.”

“I guess so. My friend Magnus, he sees a lot of things. He has a lot of cameras around town. But even he never saw who it was, he told me he was still looking.”

“I see.” They listened to the dimmed news station. The noise was incomprehensible at that level but evidently Ran picked up some information that made her snort. “Most baffling of all is how the thief manages to get in, remove the parts, and escape without my seeing until it’s too late.”

“Yeah, why just parts?”

“That’s not the mystery. It’s how someone moves so fast-” She balked. “Okay – I will admit, I did pride myself on speed both in the past and today. The speed of the average troupe member, even children. From what I’ve seen of the people in this town they are not outright athletic. If there was someone, I would have – should have been able to capture them.”

“But the Troupe never did much for observation. Not in my classes… the performance was not to watch others, but to be watched. Maybe you just didn’t see when it happened…”

“It always happens when I am distracted.”

“By what? I mean I don’t know what you do when I’m not there-”

“It was when you were there. Have you not noticed, the discoveries always happen soon after a challenge night? What better occasion for an invader?”

Ritz was silent. When he was there, of course, Ran would be busy. But who knew…? Uriel had been there one night, and Magnus… and then there was the obvious. The guy who hung around there to ‘help.’ The first person he had told about the challenges, or didn’t have to tell, because Val already knew. It was a chilling thought but –

“I don’t know anyone that fast, or light, or… quiet. Or anyone who would have a reason to do this. I mean, if they know me, then they know not to mess with you. And why didn’t I see anything?”

“The church is dark on those nights. The thief tends to be near the back of the hall, or as far from us as possible. That is my theory, but in truth I haven’t seen much of him either.”

“It sucks.”

“What?”

“Nothing. Can you change the radio channel?” Ritz continued inspecting his ceiling while Ran landed the radio on some faint modern Christmas music. “I’m sorry I made this happen.”

“This..? You aren’t to blame for the dumper any more than I am.”

The sound of that warmed him a little. “But now that you’re here, maybe we can catch him together. Like, patrol the place. Oh, I know, on the challenge night, we can pretend to fight and lure him in.”

“How undignified,” she said, but there was some humor in it. “Fake a fight? Never. Our practice days are done. But I… appreciate the ideas.”

“The dumper makes the news boring. I want to stop him too.”

“Evidently you don’t listen to much news. The dumper is the most exciting thing to happen to the city in years.”

Music hummed along.

Ritz murmured, “I really do want to stop the dumper, not just for the news. Shel and Sal hate hearing about it, and when I know it’s my fault, the challenges went on this long… and the bodies were people we knew… there are so many reasons I didn’t think of. Or I tried not to think of. It’s different from the kind of revenge that you said would help me kill you. That didn’t work, anyway. It’s not revenge at all. It’s too clear. I don’t want to think of it as killing, or causing pain, or performing well, I just want it to stop. I think I can do better when I think of it like that.”

Ran absorbed his words for a few moments, then said, “I was doubting your maturity for years, but it’s somewhat impressive, to believe you can control your… idea of revenge.”

“Really? It’s just something I thought-”

“It’s a difficult thing. You’ll see many challenges if you truly believe it.”

A new jingle began and faded into an ad for Free Drinks and Tapas in some part of the city Ritz never visited.

“I wonder what the dumper’s doing now.”

“Most likely ransacking the church, since nobody is watching. Don’t panic,” Ran commanded pre-emptively, “I’ll get to him later.”

“I’ll help.”

“Even if it’s someone you know?”

“Why do you keep asking that?”

Ran turned over. “We’ll see.”

The radio continued to play a repetitive set of Christmas tunes until just before 4am, when Ritz’s alarm clock went off. He turned it off and set it one hour later, because some odd, unnameable stressor had kept him up later than he should have been.

That little break in routine was just the start. He woke up three hours later, having not heard his alarm. Without Ran telling him not to panic, he immediately did so, tearing off his bandages (thankfully, not needed anymore) and upending the place in search of his jumpsuit. In a tired daze, it felt like the world was ending. Ran was nowhere to be seen.

—

There had been some light snowfall in the night, though evidently after he had fallen asleep. The road was covered in lines of pure, powdered white, and some grimy gray sludge where the morning commute had passed over it. Ritz ran to S2 Florist, leaving gray tracks of his own.

Back to work. Only now did the strangeness of his weekend come flooding back to him. Without the constant distraction of what to do with Ran, where to take his guest, what to eat, what to say – all the most unusual, most inexplicable parts of it were clotting together on his mind. A dreamlike, barren version of the city he thought he knew. A house with no people. A church with no visitors. Empty buses, empty roads, a whole tower with nothing but a disembodied voice for company. That’s right, Magnus, Uriel and Val, all missing. Missing? No, people knew them. Missing Persons went on news and posters. They weren’t missing from the city, but they were conveniently – coincidentally? -missing him.

Were they all avoiding him? If so, how did they know he was coming. Was he being followed?

He looked behind him. But the dream wasn’t over yet. There was nobody up or down the street. There was always supposed to be someone around. He could never manage complete quiet.

In that vein, why hadn’t his neighbor complained when he was rushing around the house?

Ritz picked up the pace. Without his bandages, he flew. Past the cafe, past the bakery, past the row of disused shops and stands and the alleyway with its empty dumpsters, past a red light (did Magnus watch those?) and his in-progress topiary, lightly dusted with snow —

Everyone gone, late for work – he was fully expecting the door to be locked, and nobody to be there. And though he could not be sure they were avoiding him or something had happened to them, the thought of not even Shel or Sal being where they should filled him with fear incomparable even to his old fear of Ran.

What would he do?

Without looking through the window he burst through the door. The bell jingled merrily and his went boots slopped in. He wasn’t tired. It was a short run and all of his stab wounds were mended and painless. But he panted. Sweat and snow dripped to the floor.

“Ritz?”

For a second, the bright lights on wood brought about an awful, recent memory.

The lights settled and the room returned to its familiar golden glow. His head jerked robotically left and right. He had missed a delivery of poinsettias.

“S-sorry I’m late–”

Shel and Sal were seated on and about the worktable at the back of the room with three cups of coffee. Standing across from them was Ran, toting a mug that read GROWING CHAMPION 19xx. Why did that phrase sound familiar?

“So I finally get to meet some of your friends,” she said.

Who had decided to put on those tinny Christmas tunes on the shop radio?

“What going on, Ritz?” Shel asked , one had on his steaming coffee mug and the other on his lap, out of sight. Sal kept her mouth pursed shut, but was glancing between Ritz and Ran.

“They seem to be decent people,” Ran commented. “Not entirely pure, but who is? You know, if the others are like them, maybe they do care about you after all.”

“Ran, what are you doing here?”

“In that case, you’d be right to care about them too. That is fair. Though, it seems the ones who went missing don’t need your care as much as these two.”

“What did you do to them?”

“I haven’t done anything.” Ran opened a drawer and inspected its contents.

“You should go outside. Maybe check the church.”

“Later.” She drew out a pair of scissors. They were Ritz’s favorite, and the only pair in the shop that hadn’t rusted.

“Ritz, I don’t know what’s going on, but this isn’t safe,” Shel told him. “You should go while you still can…”

“We’ll be fine,” Sal added, quietly.

Ritz felt sick. He backed up and almost passed out when he kicked into his toolbox, which was lying by the door beside a bag of garbage.

Ran snipped experimentally at the air. “You can tell these two were raised in a real city. But this place is hardly ‘real.’ Survival doesn’t work the same way. Did you hear, Ritz? Twenty body parts found last night, left by the busy dumper who you are so willing to devote yourself to now. I have some competition.”

“What do you mean? What the fuck? What are you doing?” Ritz blabbered.

“It was good to hear how much you care for these people last night. And no more revenge? That’s a very good one. A very good performance. But performances, Ritz, the kind you were taught – they aren’t reality.”

She extended her arm. She was wearing the coat. Her hand looked tiny in its huge pillowing covering. But how S2 looked at it, it was a menace worse than any beast’s claw.

“Of course, I still have hope that you managed to grow differently. So remember what you said. No revenge anymore.”

Her hovering hand lashed out and grasped Shel by the pinkish, girlish hair and with the other, there was a flash. The scissors ripped through his neck. Shel didn’t make a noise, but his hand rushed to the gash. Blood pooled on the ground

At the exact same moment, Sal kicked the table upward. Ran’s grip didn’t break, but keeping Shel’s head trapped against the upturned table was not useful to her. She let go, and Sal brought out the gun that Ritz had always knew the kept in the desk but hoped he would never have to see.

The gun fired. It was louder than Len’s gun, despite the size. The windows, the pots, the metal cash registers shook. Ritz saw Ran duck and dash. It fired again. Ran kicked Sal to the ground, and with body outstretched, she swing the scissors in a full arc into Sal’s shoulder. The gun didn’t drop just yet.

Ran ripped the blades free and raised her arm again.

And glanced to the side.

CRACK. The wooden table exploded against the heavier cashier desk just above where Sal lay, Ran having hopped off in time, easily. She glared at Ritz, who was holding his toolbox up in defense.

“Don’t fool with such oversized tools.” She picked up a splintered table leg and before Ritz could even lower his arms, she sank it into Shel, who was still lying on the ground. The yell rattled the store walls and the a splatter of blood hit the golden walls.

Another gunshot and Ran turned.

Ritz moved to club her, or hold her back, but it was too late, she slipped behind the desk and drove the scissors into Sal’s shoulder again, this time pressing them with her palm. The gun dropped. So Sal swung a punch.

It would have missed but for that enormous coat. Ritz heard cheap polyester rip. Another swing and audible grunt from Ran has she was caught mid-launch by the sleeve and hit. Another impact that rattled wood. Ritz vaulted over the table and caught Ran’s free hand before it went for the planted scissors, because of course that was where it was going.

Ran hissed when she saw him.

“The gun!” Sal roared. Sputtering and spilling, Ritz heard Shel struggling through a pond of blood and splinters.

“Is he-”

“Get t!” Sal kicked Ran in the gut. Unfortunately, the coat worked against the impact this time.

Ritz saw. Ran did too. Sal let Ran go and in a split second imitation, Ritz did too.

Shel reached the gun and with slippery hands, made three messy but solid shots into Ran’s side, chest and neck. They all hit and escaped with a terrific crackle, punching wet holes in Ran’s pillowy jacket.

Everyone who was standing fell to the ground.

Ritz went to his toolbox and put his head on the cool surface.

Sal immediately crawled to Shel, who laughed weakly while at the same time gurgling. “Knew this thing would come in handy eventually. You doing alright?”

“You look worse.”

“Better call the-” Sal began, turning to Ran. Ran was already upright, mouth streaming with blood and eyes like stones. Ran’s hand flew out again, and this time, tore the scissors from Sal’s shoulder before the sentence finished. Sal roared again, but this time wordless.

Ritz turned. Ran was above him, looming above like something untouchable, like all those times he had wound up on the ground during their challenges. Air was escaping from the hole in her neck. Through the bottom of her jacket, several trails of blood were falling.

“How do you feel?”

He lashed out. A kick missed. A grab for the legs and arms and hair did too. He lurched forward on unsteady feet and ended up catching her coat.

“Not so good, I see. That’s fine. You need to remember. Is it any clearer now?”

She twirled the scissors expertly, but didn’t take a jab. Instead, she wrenched him off and kicked him in the head. He backed straight into a wall and was flattened against it. He fell into the poinsettia pots. That wasn’t the last he saw. The last he saw was Ran laying into Sal, heads hidden by the counter as Shel tried to yell and scream in protest as blood rapidly escaped his neck that he was now completely forgetting to cover. Ran hit him without even turning, and the gash ripped wider. The splatter hit the ceiling. it looked a bit like a roach. And then there was another, and another…

—

“Jesus fucking christ.”

That was Uriel, pissed as usual, but particularly offended today.

“Was anyone here? God. What a mess, make sure this place is blocked off.”

That was Magnus. His voice was further off, but the Yes Sirs he received confirmed it was him.

Ritz was somewhat happy in his trance, Magnus and Uriel had come to see him. He was sitting upright, and awake, but not moving. The shop lights had been turned off (one of them was smashed anyway) and he couldn’t tell what day it was, most of the light coming in was the harsh fluorescent shine of car headlights. He heard and smelled them too.

“Check him, get him up.” Magnus approached the doorway. “But get the other two out now, police goes with them. This guy looks alright, I’ll take him to the tower.”

A car started in the lot in front. Didn’t they know they weren’t supposed to park there?

A familiar face lowered beside him. The doctor from the clinic. He recognized the face immediately, but his fist swept out automatically. There was a loud fuss and a lot of swearing. He wanted to apologize, but being a fucking retard as he had always been told he just sat there doing nothing, until Magnus quieted everyone and said, “Alright, we’ll just take him as is.”

Three unfamiliar faces appeared, but those were familiar leather jackets. One kept his arms down while the other two hoisted him up. He stood.

“Guess he likes your guys better,” Magnus said.

“Fucking jokes at a time like this?” Uriel said flatly.

Magnus ignored him. Ritz was slowly led nearer to him. He had his arms crossed and spoke as if they were at dinner. “Ritz, you look a wreck.”

He vaguely wanted to sling a punch for this one.

“I don’t want to rush you, but the news guys will be here soon and I’m not about to have that Bob and Lia duo eat you alive. I’ll have some people stay here to smooth things over, but you need to go to the tower.”

“I know where the bodies are.”

“Okay. Don’t forget it, the cops are going to want to talk to you. I’ll talk to you too, later.”

“I know who the dumper is. It’s not Ran.”

He was being led to that velvet-lined limousine again. Magnus went to the door.

“But she did this?”

“Yes.”

Uriel was doing a good impression of Magnus, arms crossed. He looked considerably more sullen. “Don’t think he needs to be reminded of that right now.”

“Alright. Yeah. Go to the tower, get some rest.”

“Are you coming too? Is there anyone in the tower?”

Magnus was puzzled. “It’s a Monday. Of course there are people there.”

“No… they should be smart and go. You were smart. When we went there, you knew, you didn’t need me to care about-” his face darkened. “She knew. I’m going to kill her. Don’t worry. I’ll do it this time. I’ll kill her, I-”

Magnus patted his shoulder warily and then leaned back and shut the door. He stretched out over the soft sofa-like seat. His scarf was matted with blood. Why did that always happen? He tore it off and put it on the floor. Then he rested his face against the fabric and closed his eyes.

—

He awoke in a world of pastel green. Green curtains, a mint-colored glow from a gentle lamplight behind them. He was lying on a clean, soft bed, the covers still tucked under the mattress. A comforter like a pillow itself, like a coat but-

He jumped off the bed and flung the curtains aside. A familiar setup, but green, not blue like the clinic he knew. There were only three beds, all against the same wall. Were Sal and Shel supposed to be here? Had something happened?

Ritz did not want to think about it. Nor did he want to think that if something had happened in this room that he had missed it. He wasn’t even injured, why had he slept?

He had to get out. No time to sleep. He was wrong, he never had anything so gratifying as time. The only one with time was Ran. Never had to sleep, never had to die. And now she was out, making sure he had no more distractions from that fact.

The places he had been stabbed began to ache all at once.

On the side of the room, there were three thin, metal desks with seats facing the beds. Behind them, set in the wall, were some television monitors. Also hanging on the wall, dwarfing everything else, was a long gold-framed painting of a forest, something Ritz had certainly never seen before (in such a large painting, or in person.)

The door was at his left. He scrambled over to it immediately. It was locked. Locked. Fucking locks. He’d had enough of them. It was courtesy to follow them as a sign, but really they could be handled if needed. And he was very close to abandoning courtesy and following needs of his own.

Instinctively, he made sure nobody was looking, and that’s when he noticed the camera hanging above the door. It was at the very top edge of the wall, near the ceiling, where it could see over the curtains with ease. As well as evade the hands of those it was observing.

That could be handled too, but…  lock and camera, that would take some time.

Ritz poured himself some water from the jug by his bed and went to the window, at the end of the room farthest from the door. It must have been nighttime. It looked so much like a mirror at this time. If he hadn’t already known that, hadn’t been spooked into thinking it was someone in the room in nights past, he would have been scared. His reflection looked a lot like Ran’s.

His reflection wasn’t so clear tonight. It was snowing.

Ritz went to the window. Against the blackness, he saw the lights of buildings, white flakes in the distance, small as snow, but not moving. Down below, rooftops were turning white. It was a view that nobody could see without the tower. Looking down, he was on roughly the same floor. Same view, too. The blue clinic could be just next door.

He hated fighting in snow. But there was no time to be picky.

There was another camera on this wall, above the window. If someone had been behind it on a Sunday, someone had to be there now. Are you being followed? Right now, he hoped he was. He waved and stared into the glass eye. Naturally, no response. Well, he grabbing the camera might get something – but was there a speaker anywhere?

Maybe breaking down the door would get the same kind of effect.

Ritz considered this in the warmth of the clinic room that he knew he was going to leave in a short while. He was still in his jumpsuit, perhaps his warmest outfit. Thank their cruel god for small miracles. Coincidences.

A large chunk of snow fell past the window. Ritz turned.

That was when a huge, ungainly figure also passed by. In the split second timeframe he saw in the window’s gilded frame, bulging eyes, teeth and trailing lifeless limbs, barrelling straight down the sheer glass face of the building, to ground.

He heard nothing, but didn’t look to confirm the fall.

Instead, he rushed straight for the door and slammed into the bolt with his shoulder. The frame made a tremendous CRUNCH and loosed slightly. Paint chips littered his shoulders. He slammed into it again, kicked it, smashed the door knob off – it was in the way – and flung it at the camera. To the tune of glass shattering, he took a running launch at the bolt again.

CRUNCH.

Tap tap tap.

Ritz froze on his next wind up. Someone was outside, walking down the hall.

Tap tap tap.

He could hear the footsteps. So they were on his floor. That was what he wanted. Was it? It could be Ran. She had said she could come here on her own. And he had always thought the glass too thin to be any real defense… And yet…

Tap tap tap….

Those footsteps were too flippant, too foolish to be her. A flat footed idiot was no trouble to him. Maybe his fooling with the door and camera had actually worked as intended.

The tapping stopped. There was a jingling from outside, like the radio carols about to start. Ritz too a step back. It was just some clumsy fool – but to be cautious, there was space to run. He could kick out the chairs and beds. The curtain rods were weak too. They would- they would do- in…

The door opened. Against his will, Ritz exhaled loudly. The top of the doorframe collapsed and he heard a “Whoa.”

“Val. It’s you.”

“It’s me.” Val chewed loudly and smiled. ”Evening, Ritz.”

—

Without much to say, and Val continuing to chew whatever it was he had, they headed for the elevators. Val had either acquired a key card, or remembered to bring his.

“Here you go.”

On arrival, Val’s hands had been occupied with his  black sports bag and Ritz’s ornate toolbox, the freshly laundered scarf draped over his shoulders. He handed the toolbox and scarf to Ritz and patted himself down for his card. “That thing’s heavy as hell. Can’t feel my hands anymore. But though you would need it.”

“Yes.”

“Hm. You’re looking surprisingly good after what happened.”

They stepped into the small lit compartment. Ritz noticed another camera in the front corner.

“So what happened? Wait- Magnus said not to force you to talk about it. That’s okay, I can guess. Ran did what you always thought she would do to outsiders. Messed them up real good. Or bad. Do you know what that means? You don’t have to answer that.”

“Are Shel and Sal–”

“They’re alive. Ah- is that still cause for revenge? I don’t know how these things work. How your things work, I mean-”

“Val shut up. Just shut the fuck up.”

Val shrugged and non-committally shut his mouth. He soon began chewing again. Ritz balled his fists and groaned. “God dammit.”

Val stopped chewing. He exaggerated swallowing and cough. Then he asked, “So what happened to you?”

Ritz bit his lip. The elevator continued with all the urgency of a dying snail. So he told Val, in as few words as he could manage, what happened.

The elevator reached the ground floor. Through the wide open window of a front wall, Ritz saw what looked like the world being erased. The pavilion was a simple, pleasant white void. In spite of the dark sky, the view was radiant.

Val set his bag on one of the terribly uncomfortable looking lobby chairs and began unpacking. “I hope you don’t mind if I leave these here. They’ll be better off indoors on a night like this. And this thing is also way too heavy.” What he was unpacking were Ritz’s plant collection, taken from his house. The orchid pot was crushed beyond repair. In fact the only plant that still looked lively was the feathery green weed Shel and Sal had given him. Val unfolded its leaves carefully. Before he zipped the bag up again, Ritz saw a flash of metal tools. Far more than the one sword he had taken from Magnus. No wonder it was heavy.

“Val.”

“That’s my name.”

“You’re the dumper.”

“Wow. You know, I never liked the name they picked. It’s appropriate enough, I guess.” Val stood up. “Whatever the name, yep. That’s me.”

“Why are you doing it?”

“Dumping the parts? Well, stands to reason that they aren’t the parts I’m looking for. Why do I go back, well, I’m looking for something in particular. What are you-”

Ritz swept up to him like a shadow and hammered a forearm against his neck. “Stop saying such FUCKING USELESS THINGS. I know you are trying not to answer me. But if you keep going like this, I am going to cut your fingers off and dump them-”

“God – get off, I can’t even try to answer you. Ugh. Okay, okay. I’m looking for the leader. Any will do. But I’m guessing the only one there is the one before Ran. The dude you never saw. And -whoa-whoa-whoa put those shears down, I’ll tell you why. It’s because… well, it was in their old acts, and even you were the one who said, the Leader only dies by their own hand. It sounds like a ridiculous metaphor, but you know – I always believed it. I wanted to believe it. So what if suicide’s the only way out? Look at it another way: They can get shot and cut and beaten but they still live. ‘Only dies by their own hand’ is a poetic way of putting it. In most legends, that’s called immortality.”

“What?”

“Again with the questions. Living forever. Infallible. Unbeatable. Sorry, well, maybe not unbeatable, but indestructible. Do you know how many have killed to try to attain that sort of power? It’s the kind of thing that most people will say doesn’t even exist. Like Santa. Sorry. You knew that, ri-”

“The Leader is dead.”

“Is he? Have you noticed the smoke? A black cloud, over the Church at night? It’s dark, no moon – maybe that condition was picked on purpose – when you go to you challenges. Is it coming from Ran? No, I’ve been watching, it’s coming from somewhere else. The smoke is the trademark of the Asahara Troupe, it apparently gives them strength, puts them in some kind of trance. A drug, yeah, but what kind? Made of what? It’s still coming from somewhere in that building, among the bodies, and I’m pretty sure it’s coming from the guy who managed it. Hoarded it away when the cult got exiled.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I want to find that body. I want to find out the secret. To being the Leader – being unkillable. Who wants to be killed, right? Other than-”

Ritz rubbed his forehead and turned the arm-length shears around in his hand. The weight was inexplicably comforting. Val sat on one of the chairs that looked like a letter Q and rested his head on his hands. His eyes were wild, slightly crossed and hard to focus.

“I will admit. I was not as respectful towards the bodies I did not want as I should have been. Often I would check them and dump them straight away. I could only take parts because Ran’s got them pretty well cemented together, I can never get a whole body out. Couldn’t carry it, anyway. I think she’s taken to burying the parts she recovered. Of course, it could be because shovels are easier to come by than construction materials these days. The South is… very nearly complete, Magnus says.”

“Val.”

“Yeah?”

“The Leader had his arms and legs cut off. If you’re looking to take those parts, it might be hard.”

“I haven’t found him yet. He could be loose, like a couple of the the surface bodies. He did die a lot later after all.”

“How about, if you don’t find him, you take the new Leader?”

For the first time, Val was silent. And Ritz smiled. It made his face tired. “I’m going to kill her. Tonight.”

“Look man, don’t rush.”

“If I can’t, then I will die. I don’t mean I will let her kill me. I know she won’t do it, and that’s why I have to decide. If I do not succeed tonight, if I wake up tomorrow and Ran is still alive, I will kill myself and it will be over. I am tired of having this duty and having to pay the bills and wash the clothes and think about the Dumper and get asked if I’m being followed. I don’t want her or you to ask which one’s more important. I don’t want to be in hospital again. I’m telling you this, because I need you to remind me. If I forget. Or stop and think I have time again.”

“Well. That’s your decision, but, uh.”

“And another favor…”

“What?”

“Would you write a speech for me? And make sure I have a good funeral? Not to many people. Also, I want-”

“Nah, man. I can’t write speeches, are you crazy? I’m not embarrassing myself just because you went and offed yourself when you didn’t even have to.”

Ritz grimaced and snapped the shears as if he were thinking of taking off his own head, then and there

Val groaned loudly and flopped back on the unhelpful contours of the chair. “I’m not in the business of telling people not to die. There’s a lot of people me, Magnus, Uriel – had actually preferred to be dead. And once in awhile we want it enough to make it true. We’re kind of selfish about your own skins, you see, that’s why we avoided you a couple days back. But you dying doesn’t help any of us. If Ran’s after your friends then it’s probably better you arearound so someone on our side had half an idea of what’s going on. Someone who occasionally cracks a joke, will listen to Uriel drone on, eat Magnus’s weird oily food and watches out for us on the roof. It’s better than nothing at all. And at times when we aren’t under attack, the free time we decide what to do with, it’s… infinitely better to have you around.”

The shears went back into the toolbox.

“Sucks what happened to S2, but they aren’t dead, and from what I heard, they surprised you. Don’t underestimate our ability to defend ourselves, either.”

Ritz snapped the lid of the toolbox shut. He felt calm. Not just calm, but slow, heavy, at ease. Slow as the snowfall, it was like he had suddenly gained time. But his time wasn’t about to be wasted, as it had in the past. And there was that last reassurance. In his pool of calm he pulled a slight frown.

“Val.”

“Don’t wear it out.”

“What? No, you’re joking, aren’t you. But I have to ask something. Something now. I know you were looking for the Leader when I had Ran’s attention on me. But there were times she did see you. And she followed you.”

“I could do without being reminded! Scary times, scary times. But I-”

“You always got away. Ran is fast. But somehow you – you always look like you’re about to fall, or that you can’t run – but you were faster. How? I don’t understand. Ran didn’t understand either.”

Val looked blissfully up the hollow center of the tower, to where the glass rooftop was nearly obscured in snow. “Trade secrets. You had to join the Troupe to learn what you can do. You can join me to learn how to clown a murderer.” He sat up. “But I did promise I’d help you, so here’s the thing. I’m not faster. I just know enough people. Dignity, independence and beauty are just a nice theory, but you ask anyone now, and they’ll say to win in the world, you need connections.”

“So you work together.”

“I wouldn’t call it work, more talk and trick. Man, imagine the tricks you can play when you’re unkillable, though!” Val laughed. It was not a nice sound. “Okay, I’m getting ahead of myself. There are probably all sorts of hidden limits that will rear their ugly head when I finally track that Leader down. But even if it’s actually specific, at least you can still put together specific tricks. I always suspected it was just a biological solution to fear or pain, maybe, but with just that you can–“

“You sound sure we will win.”

“We? You sound sure that I’m going to be of help.”

“You already helped.”

“Then you just have to keep up your end of the deal, so I know I did a good job.” Val continued gazing at the disappearing sky. Ritz went to the chair and sat in its neighbor, which was shaped like an R, pattered with cow spots. Ritz picked up one of his potted plants and put it on his lap. His strange, feathery fern. He grasped the biggest, most hardy leafy plume with his fist and tore it from the stem and ate it.

Ritz chewed the tasteless, ashy leaves with vigour. Gnashing, crushing the tiny bodies with his teeth made him feel slightly more battle-ready. His gums may have bled. Val sat up in alarm. “You’re doing this now? Can I have the orchid?”

Ritz very nearly threw him the pot. The quiet lobby echoed with the the crunch and grate of teeth. Outside, the snow lightened, just a bit.

—

The snowfall had stopped by the time they passed through the market district, headed for the abandoned suburbs. The snow was patchy on the salted road, but they were the first to make tracks on the fresh silvery shine of the sidewalk. S2 was pent off with police tape, a makeshift metal wall taller than any man was also set up around the storefront. There were two cameras affixed to the top of the wall. In the alley beside the store, there was a dumpster overflowing with plastic bags, and a bulky bird-shaped topiary capped with snow.

Ritz attacked it with the shears, and then the small sickle. Snow flew. Leaves dropped.

“What are you doing?” Val asked patiently.

Ritz left the mangled trunk lying in the alley like a fresh Dumper victim. “I’m done.”

“Just blowing off steam?”

“There was something I always wanted to test. For a time like this.”

“Oh. Did you find what you were looking for?”

Again he stowed the shears. He inspected the edge of the sickle and, somewhat impressed, he placed it back in the case as well. “Yes.” And apologetically, he said too, “Plants like that aren’t going to live through the winter anyway.”

“That’s the spirit.”

—

The houses. Abandoned – but he knew they weren’t empty. What a waste. A waste of space, a waste of perfectly good houses. Ritz picked up the heaviest rock he could find and bounced it in his hand like the ball at a Big Game. Then he threw it at the nearest window, smashing it clean through. To the tinkling of glass, he picked up another, and handed it to Val.

“Enough of this disrespect. Tonight we reach the end. Not alone, but-”

“I can’t throw this, c’mon. I’m carrying something.”

“DO IT.”

Val threw. His limp pitch managed to get the stone halfway across the lawn where it struck another stone and broke in half. Ritz laughed and Val smiled sheepishly. “That’s why I’m not doing the fighting. I mean performing. You still care about that?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

The laughter stopped when they reached the base of the Church.

She was there. It was a challenge night, so she’d be there.

Lined with snow, it was all the more obvious what a wreck it was. Not a single edge was even. The roof, as Ran had said, long ago fell through. There was not a single window intact and what walls that stood were full of holes. What wasn’t cracked stone was fresher cement, fortified with the bodies of the dead. And that’s why they hadn’t fallen. Somewhere in there, was what Val was looking for.

Thinking of it that way… there really was an awful lot of wall. Val knew it.

“I bet I can find the Leader’s body before you win.”

“Maybe I will win you a fresher body before then.”

Val smiled sweetly and unzipped his bag. Out of it he drew a small, slender ice pick. He looked ridiculous, backpacked and awkwardly holding that tiny sword. “Well. Time to go.”

“Go where?”

“Go in, of course. Oh, me? I’m going around the back. Don’t worry, I think you’ll be able to see me today.”

Ritz chose not to argue. He inhaled, and exhaled emphatically.

“I never could figure out those doors. One of them’s broken, right? I always-”

Ritz bounded up the steps and gave the doors a kick right in the middle of where they met. With a snap, the broken door flew, and the one good door’s hinge finally gave out, bursting free from the decrepit wall and dropping in and down to the ground. They both landed with a soft puff on the bed of snow and flowers below.

Less subtle was the slam of boots on their fallen faces. They cracked and splintered from the force. Ritz looked up into the darkness and thundered wordlessly from the base of his lungs. It was much better than talking. He was so much better at it.