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Authors: David Horscroft
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energy in a black array. In the early mornings the dome cast a shadow over the complex, but after that it basked in the sun until it set on the mountains. My heart jumped slightly as I picked up movement—two men and a woman slinking around the walls. I watched them intently, but they thought better of intruding and loped off into the shadows.
Closer to where I sat, a plume of dust—or smoke?—snaked through the roads. I pressed my form to the bricks as a bike curved into the street below me, nipping around broken cars and debris before gunning for the quarantine cordon. Someone was in a hurry.
To the north-east, the city jarred the broken landscape. Despite the dry season, the river still flowed, passing the RailTech office block and the Riverside Mercy hospital. Sturrock was probably there, which meant I should probably make plans to be there too. Through a third-storey window I saw someone retching violently.
Vincent’s cover-house was being swarmed by construction workers. I could see straight into his living room, blackened and blasted as it was.
‘Gas explosion’. Realistic.
The RailTech offices always pulled my eye while I was up here. It annoyed me and distracted my thoughts and musings. I’d considered burning it to the ground, but my self-preservation instincts overpowered my appreciation of aesthetics every time. An upward tilt of the binoculars caused the floors to flash before me, until a figure caught my eye.
He was beautiful: sleek brown hair, hard blue eyes and a razor-sharp jawline. A scowl carved his face as those eyes—intense beyond dreaming—glared over the perimeter walls. As I drank him in, he shifted and—for a strangely harrowing second—I stared into those narrow slits.
I twitched, repressing an urge to press myself into the bricks again. There was no way he could have seen me, but the full intensity of that gaze was unexpected. The slightest flush had found my cheeks, spawned from the desire of something new. I found myself wondering what it would be like to strangle that neck.
Slowly, deliberately, he opened the window and extended his arm into the wind. We both breathed deeply. The scowl deepened and he retreated, leaving my line of sight.
Dammit.
I flitted over the adjacent rooms in the hope of catching him again. No such luck.
Suddenly bored and no longer hungry, I flipped the tin can over the edge with my foot. Beans and sauce splattered against the wall and started creeping, gradually, away from the winds. A voice coughed in my head.
Red drips. You’ve seen that recently.
I had. I pulled out the pictures of the murder-suicide and leafed through them until I found the one I wanted. Blood drops on the window: the trickle flowed straight down, then tilted to the right, and finally straight down again.
Razorjaw was jettisoned from my mind at orbital speed. Sturrock could wait. Right now, I had to get across the cordon and into the flat. I looked at the window in the photograph one last time.
Definitely, undeniably closed.
#0810
“This may be the last will and testament of K Fletcher. Valerie has given me something to drink. I drank it through an intravenous drip, and now I’m sitting on a pile of body parts in the middle of the city. My heart is racing, my vision and memory is flashing in and out and I can taste lemon juice on my tongue. I can feel my urges pawing up and down my body with perverse and heavy hands. Their roughness is my only solace.
“Do not mourn me. I would have probably killed you.”
9: Old People Make Better Kindling
A short drop from a ledge took me to the street. The afternoon bluster kicked grit into my face as I made it to my favourite crossing point. The sun was still high, but the curfew was approaching; I had to be fast. I breezed past the receptionist—looking decidedly less cheery—and went back up to apartment 202 .
Back in the room, I stared at the window. Still closed. The blood had been washed off, but faint red traces
Closer to where I sat, a plume of dust—or smoke?—snaked through the roads. I pressed my form to the bricks as a bike curved into the street below me, nipping around broken cars and debris before gunning for the quarantine cordon. Someone was in a hurry.
To the north-east, the city jarred the broken landscape. Despite the dry season, the river still flowed, passing the RailTech office block and the Riverside Mercy hospital. Sturrock was probably there, which meant I should probably make plans to be there too. Through a third-storey window I saw someone retching violently.
Vincent’s cover-house was being swarmed by construction workers. I could see straight into his living room, blackened and blasted as it was.
‘Gas explosion’. Realistic.
The RailTech offices always pulled my eye while I was up here. It annoyed me and distracted my thoughts and musings. I’d considered burning it to the ground, but my self-preservation instincts overpowered my appreciation of aesthetics every time. An upward tilt of the binoculars caused the floors to flash before me, until a figure caught my eye.
He was beautiful: sleek brown hair, hard blue eyes and a razor-sharp jawline. A scowl carved his face as those eyes—intense beyond dreaming—glared over the perimeter walls. As I drank him in, he shifted and—for a strangely harrowing second—I stared into those narrow slits.
I twitched, repressing an urge to press myself into the bricks again. There was no way he could have seen me, but the full intensity of that gaze was unexpected. The slightest flush had found my cheeks, spawned from the desire of something new. I found myself wondering what it would be like to strangle that neck.
Slowly, deliberately, he opened the window and extended his arm into the wind. We both breathed deeply. The scowl deepened and he retreated, leaving my line of sight.
Dammit.
I flitted over the adjacent rooms in the hope of catching him again. No such luck.
Suddenly bored and no longer hungry, I flipped the tin can over the edge with my foot. Beans and sauce splattered against the wall and started creeping, gradually, away from the winds. A voice coughed in my head.
Red drips. You’ve seen that recently.
I had. I pulled out the pictures of the murder-suicide and leafed through them until I found the one I wanted. Blood drops on the window: the trickle flowed straight down, then tilted to the right, and finally straight down again.
Razorjaw was jettisoned from my mind at orbital speed. Sturrock could wait. Right now, I had to get across the cordon and into the flat. I looked at the window in the photograph one last time.
Definitely, undeniably closed.
#0810
“This may be the last will and testament of K Fletcher. Valerie has given me something to drink. I drank it through an intravenous drip, and now I’m sitting on a pile of body parts in the middle of the city. My heart is racing, my vision and memory is flashing in and out and I can taste lemon juice on my tongue. I can feel my urges pawing up and down my body with perverse and heavy hands. Their roughness is my only solace.
“Do not mourn me. I would have probably killed you.”
9: Old People Make Better Kindling
A short drop from a ledge took me to the street. The afternoon bluster kicked grit into my face as I made it to my favourite crossing point. The sun was still high, but the curfew was approaching; I had to be fast. I breezed past the receptionist—looking decidedly less cheery—and went back up to apartment 202 .
Back in the room, I stared at the window. Still closed. The blood had been washed off, but faint red traces
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