Dark Tales From Dandelion

1

Jubilee Street was really more a district than a street. People referred to this part of Harrentree as ‘Jubilee Street’ because the main strip where most of the action was, was indeed called just that. The buildings pushed at the sky, black cacophonies, most shut down, and the climax of their climb was spoiled by boarded windows and holes in their towering walls. There was a Boost vendor on every corner, ready to give the first one free to any unfamiliar face—the familiar faces owed the vendor money.

The Drifter drifted out of the Roxy Milk bar and down the street, bleeding into the dim red buzz of evening second winds. Most of the residents of the Street didn’t wake up until now, where they slipped into a little slice of eternity in the night where nothing was against the rules. Vance was walking with a bit of a swerve, and he started to worry(in what capacity he could worry while under the influence of complete apathetic euphoria) that he had stayed up too late into the comedown and Roxy Milk inebriation. He walked past shadows that whispered fantastic futures at him. The advertising was at least somewhat honest in its conspicuous manifestations on Jubilee Street.

“No, no. I think I’ll be jus’ fine withou’, thank ya,” Vance responded, swaying.

These dark vendors were everywhere, like moths in tall grass, swarming with every step he took.

“Hey honey, only one chip for 10 minutes,” said a black man that wore only a black harness.

“Oh, tha’ sound fine, but I need ta—”

“I’ll suck yo cock,” said a light skinned woman sitting by a Boost syringe disposal can. She wore more clothes than the man, but barely. “Ooo you ain’t nevah had it like this, baby. Like a squim fruit through a soft metal tube.”

“Really, I … Not tonight. I gotta—“

“Why don’t you take your helmet off, fuckwad?” said a rough voice from the shadows.

“Who said tha’? Where you at? I’ll kill ya,” Vance replied as he swayed down the street—the dim, red lights aiding him not at all with his blurring vision.

He looked up and saw Mother right there in the middle of an intersection, smiling at him. Sweat dampened his shirt. His mouth went dry. She wore all white just like she had at the tower, her yellow hair reaching down to her tailbone.

“I’m so s-sorry, Motha. They t-took me an’ I nevah … I couldn’t nevah feel no peace again. I c-couldn’ feel nothin’! That’s why! That’s why!”

The Woman In White smiled, then black wings shot out from her back and her face changed into the shape of one of the winged men that had taken him to Lavender from the Forever Forest. It flew; Vance drew the seven shooter, but the Roxy Milk had made his hands slow. The thing closed its hands around Vance’s neck, threw him to the ground and squeezed.

Vance could taste copper in his throat as it began to bleed. Two spots began tingling at Vance’s shoulder blades, and he assumed rocks on the road were pushing into his back from the force of the man choking him. What the fuck what the fuck what the FUCK, was all he could manage to think.

Vince the sheath moved the sesnickie blade from underneath Vance, scraping it across the stones of the street and Vance’s back, which was very painful. Vince pushed the blade’s handle into Vance’s flailing right hand and away from Vance’s body so there would be room for him to swing the blade. Vance was losing consciousness, but he managed to spit blood into the thing’s face which distracted it for a moment; he struck at once, swinging the blade wildly and cutting off first the left wing with the upswing, then the right with the downstroke.

The thing shrieked and Vance could see it trying to attune the Inner Vibrations with the help of his eye visor—he remembered that these things had been able to attune and had used their vibrations on him in a team effort when they’d taken him to Lavender—but Vance knew that his sesnickie blade would have stopped those vibrations from being attuned. Sesnickie blades cut through vibrations. Vance watched the man struggle for a moment, then tranced, making himself very light and the other man very heavy. He jumped straight at the now wingless creature, his body parallel to the ground—he felt that tingling underneath his shoulder blades again—and cut the man’s head clean off. Blood shot into the air and covered Vance’s back. The Ol’ Fuck back at the Lavender laboratory had picked his color scheme well—the blood red of the cape and the midnight black of the suit did not show any blood. The white sesnickie blade was completely covered, however, and Vance flicked the blade to one side, then the other, then he lifted the point of the blade over his right shoulder where Vince reached up with its rubbery black flesh to meet the sword like a squid grabbing its prey. Vince pulled the sesnickie blade over the shoulder and down Vance’s back, point first, where it covered the entire surface of the blade itself. Vance knew that Vince would take care of the blood, cleaning the blade and then sharpening it.

Thanks, Vince, Vance thought toward the sheath. I’d be fucked if it wasn’t for you.

Vance turned around and looked from the blood on the stones to the body lying there. It was a woman’s body, not a man’s, and there were no wings. The woman wore a white dress like Mother, but the hair on the severed head was not yellow, but dark brown.

Vance’s head had cleared enough to tell him he had hallucinated at least some of the encounter, but he wasn’t sure which parts. He shivered and decided to make haste toward his room at the Inn while his adrenaline-induced lucidity was still in effect. He lit a cigarette with a match he'd drawn from one of the cape pockets. The brand name ‘Nevers’ was stamped on the paper near the filter of the cigarette. He drew in heavily, thinking it might make some sense of the moment, but of course, it didn't. Then he ran; he ran from the scene as fast as he could. When the woman was found, she’d be identified as probably a Roxy Milk fiend who was also employed at one of the many brothels coloring Jubilee Street. There wouldn't be a whole lot of noise about it; these things happened pretty regularly on the Street, and if you weren't careful, they might happen to you. Vance would have been the dead one tonight if not for Vince’s weird connection to the blade. I stayed up too damn long this time.

He ran with the cigarette dangling from his mouth, making it harder to breathe. Still, he thought it was helping him focus on the task of getting to his room without hallucinating another murderous hooker. The Street was beginning to fill up with people, so he took a few side streets to avoid as many as possible. He didn't trust himself with people at present.

He ran into someone trying to sell him Sly Grass, another trying to get him to spare some chips. He stumbled past this last who actually tugged on his cape as he went past. It was too much—the night was filling the streets and it had begun to pull the air from his lungs. The cigarette had gone out after burning off the final two letters of the brand name, leaving the first three: ‘Nev.’

Vance’s adrenaline seemed to be wearing off, and he felt the dark red glow of the Street closing in around him. I jus’ hafta get to the Golden Goose. Gol-den Goose. Golden …. He looked up and realized he was standing below a golden-lit sign with a goose that seemed to be having quite a bit more fun as a sign than Vance was having with being a human. Underneath the flamboyant goose, the sign read ‘The Golden Goose Inn and Eatery,’ and underneath this in smaller print, ‘two beds to a room, no bedfellows, two chips a night. NO PETS.’ It was more beautiful than a Boost after a good night’s sleep.

Vance laughed aloud, and a few people walking by on the Street gave him strange looks. It wasn't that he was laughing to himself—Jubilee Street was full of madmen—rather, it was the way in which Vance laughed; it was the laugh of a man who was clearly mad, but was aware of it. This type of laugh called to the neurosis of anyone who'd ever lied to themselves, which is why the people looked. They didn't like being called out in such a way. They were not insane; their laughter was always genuine, and all of their insecurities valid; but mostly these people didn't have insecurities, and that was that. Such was the general attitude toward those sickies sleeping in the streets that were really just a more honest version of ill: they—are—other, and how dare they bring their lost marbles too close to home.

Vance walked through the doors of the Inn. The auburn-haired girl behind the dark oaken front desk smiled an invitation at Vance—a smile she’d given him every night since he’d started staying at the Inn—but he hadn’t acknowledged before tonight. Why not? He thought.

“If you get a minute, I’ll be in my room, room seven; I’d ‘preciate it if you'd come and take a good look at something in there. I don’t have a lot a time, but I do have ‘nuff for you.” Vance said. He needed sleep, and he knew that the company of a woman was something helpful in the process of getting there. She was beautiful and seemed to be very willing as her grin was spreading up her pale cheeks. How had he missed her before? She wore a flannel button-up tucked into blue jeans, her waist was slim, and her cleavage teased at breasts that would fill his hands. Her hips curved out nicely before being obscured by the desk. Yes, he could use her company indeed. Sometimes the Boost comedown would have him lying in bed tossing and turning for six hours before he finally just Boosted again regardless of how tired he was; maybe this would help ensure his getting a much-needed good night’s rest.

Vance went to his room; she came, they made love, and he slept for the first time in five days. He’d needed it because, after tonight, he didn’t think he would rest for a long time.