#spiders guy

In the dimming blue twilight, dark clouds sat just over the horizon of squared off rooftops and a crane, and a man in the shadows behind a dumpster watched the green door. He coughed into his fist, phlegmy and thick, then spat a loogie onto the pavement. A stripe of incandescent light zigzagged up the stairs and stuttered over cracks in the asphalt. Four silhouettes cut into the light, slipped out the door, then shut the door behind them, trapping the light back in the basement. As they came up the stairs, Spiders looked over the tall pretty girl, the tall pretty boy, the short androgynous one, and the short waifish girl. Children, the lot of them.

“Lost babies,” remarked Spiders Guy. “Lost little babes.” He didn’t step forward out from behind the dumpster or anything. No, he just started speaking from where they couldn’t even see him yet. “Downstairs treat you well, plaything?”

“Okay.” Da-eun immediately brought up her bat and rested it on her palm. “We’re not doing this tonight, or ever.”

“You left the light, but the shadows scare you,” Spiders observed. “You’re thieves and breakers, breaking in, breaking the materials.” He had neck-length gray hair under a trucker hat, a weathered face that was half scratchy with stubble, and wore a thick flannel jacket over a zip-up hoodie and a few sweaters, old but reliable jeans, and steel-toe work boots. The teenagers could see none of that because still he stood back by the wall, and here behind the building no street lights reached them.

“You’re the upstairs geezer,” recognized Bevie. “Spiders.”

“Spiders?” asked Da-eun, concerned.

“He’s the Spiders Guy,” explained Bevie. She started walking onward, feet flinching on the cold asphalt and sharp pebbles. “Got a ciggy, Spiders?”

He stepped forward and fished out a crushed pack. “Peck on the cheek, sweetheart, and I won’t tell your daddy you’re out with your friends.”

“And you’ll give me a cigarette?” asked Bevie.

“Don’t,” Da-eun warned.

Spiders grinned and held up a cigarette. Bevie put her hands on his arm and stood on her tiptoes to give him a little smooch on his craggy cheek. He smiled and patted her shoulder.

“There you go, grandpa,” Bevie said.

He passed her the cigarette. “Sweet little thing.”

“Do you know him?” asked Paul.

Bevie let Spiders give her a light, then took a long drag before she responded through curling blue smoke. “I told you who he is, didn’t I? This is our neighbor.”

“Better hurry on out of the woods before the wolf comes home,” warned Spiders.

Bevie nodded. “You’re right, old man. Thanks for the ciggy. You’re the best!” She hugged his arm then walked on back over to Da-eun. “Relax, bitch, jeez.”

“The hippie has the most shadows,” observed Spiders. He pointed the fingers holding his cigarette at Paul. “How’d you gather so much shade, hippie?”

“Let’s go,” declared Da-eun, and she started toward her car. She’d parked on the street.

“Do you see ghosts?” Paul asked Spiders.

Spiders hocked up another loogie and spat. “Boy is spun of sugar and cinnamon. Sugarglass boy. Bet you got smooth, soft fingers. Too many wicks: two lit, one soot and smoke.” He tapped ash from the tip of his cigarette then sucked his teeth. His eyes fell on Calvin. “Fat tits.”

“That’s all you gotta say about me? Paul is sugar glass poetry and I’m just fat tits? Fuck you,” Calvin sputtered and flipped Spiders off.

Spider put up his own middle fingers and waggled them mockingly as if to cast a spell. “Woooh-oooooh tomcat, throw your hissy spit.”

Da-eun had made it to the end of the alley and put a hand on her hip, other hand leaning on the top of the baseball bat propped out like a cane. “Come on! Stop hanging around that creep and let’s get out of here.”

Paul put an arm around Calvin and ushered him toward their waiting driver. Bevie strolled along with them, smiling over her glowing cinder.

---

The radio played Janet Jackson. A comfortable orange glow from the street light washed over the inside of Da-eun’s coupe. She reached across the passenger seat and pulled the lever to rocket it forward so Calvin could get out. From the sidewalk he waved back at the car, then crossed the lawn to his front door. Paul waved back, then Alis opened the door to confront her son about the lateness of the hour and his lack of a phone call. Calvin disappeared into his house.

“So where are we taking her? Where did you live before, Bevie?” Da-eun asked, buckling back up and checking her mirrors before pulling back out into the street.

“Ugh,” Bevie replied and encircled her arms around Paul’s arm, leaning her head on his shoulder. “Paul, you’ll let me sleep at your place, right?”

He shook his head. “My grandparents would never allow it, and if you think we’re getting cozy you are very much mistaken.”

“Just tell me where you live and I’ll get you back to your family,” insisted Da-eun.

Bevie pushed off from Paul and pulled her knees up to her chest. “Drop Paul off first.”

“My car is back at Hyun’s house,” replied Paul. He watched her run her fingers over her lips and apply more lip balm, and he remembered Bevie didn’t know who Hyun was. “Which is Da-eun’s house, while she’s back from college anyway. So she has to drop you off first.”

Da-eun pulled off to the side of the road and parked. She’d circled a block in the suburb where Calvin lived while she´d waited for directions to her next stop, but didn’t want to waste any more gas. With her arm hooked over the backrest, she twisted around to look into the back seat. “You’re not going to live in my car, and Paul’s not taking you home. With how you’re not exactly dressed, there’s not really any place to take you but back to your place. It’s safe there, right?”

Bevie looked back at Da-eun with a deadened, sulky pout.

“Is it safe?” asked Da-eun.

The girl shrugged. “Wouldn’t it be cool if my parents moved while I was gone?”

“No,” said Paul, looking at her weird. “It would not be ‘cool.’”

“Maybe they figured I died and they didn’t want to hang around in a place with all these suckass memories so they packed up and moved to, I dunno, Ohio or Montana or someshit. And I was just completely on my own. I think that would be totally neato.” She grinned.

Da-eun let a few beats pass to give the remark some space then said, “You have a weird sense of humor.”

Bevie rolled her eyes and hugged her knees closer. She rattled off her address.

“With your knees up like that I can see your coochie,” Da-eun told her. She turned back around in her seat and started her car back up. “Don’t forget you’re basically naked. Can you give me directions there, or will I have to get out a road map?”

“I don’t know where we are,” laughed Bevie. “What makes you think I can give directions to where I live? Dumbass.”

“Bitch,” muttered Da-eun, and she turned her engine back off before digging a road map out of the door pocket and turning on the ceiling light. She began to cross reference the address to listings on the side of the map and found where it indicated the house would be on the grid. “H...5…” Her press-on nail traced across the paper riddled with veins in blue and red over squares of green and beige, winding rivers and lakes in pale blue, and tiny text.

Paul felt the extra souls churning in his throat. He contained their questions and conversations, like Calvin had been unable to. How had Spiders known Duria was there? Could anybody else see her without mirrors?

Da-eun dropped Bevie off at a small house up on a hill, with a steep, narrow cement staircase to the front porch. An old blue and white pickup parked on the sloping driveway of two paved stripes on a section of lawn cut at a shallower angle than the rest. Bevie shut the door behind her and smiled up at the house. She heard the woman who’d driven her say, “Hey! Weird bitch!”

Reaching across the passenger seat to the window, Da-eun handed her a receipt with a number written on the back. “Call me if...just if you want to. You can call me. It’s my family’s number so my dad or my brother might pick up. Ask for Dee.”

“Dee,” repeated Bevie. She reconsidered a snarky response but instead gave a quick nod. “Thanks. How did you know about me?”

“Ask him.” Da-eun nodded toward Paul. “He and his friend insisted we come rescue you. Cal even knew it was you in there. Beats me how. They say it was ghosts.”

Bevie smirked. “So Casper brought a rescue team.”

“I guess. Have a good night.” Da-eun settled back into the driver’s seat and buckled up.

“Night,” bid Bevie. She waved to Paul, then started up the stairs as he waved back.

Paul held his jacket in his lap and caught Dee’s eye in the rearview mirror. “Back to your place then, huh?”

---

A mug of tea steamed between Paul’s palms. He sat at the dining room table, thinking about how he was going to affect one more rescue that night. Chewing on his lip, he looked at the clock on the wall. His grandparents had a Roman numeral clock with a silver rim, circular and plain. An elderly corgi slept on a plaid dog bed near the fireplace. Paul thought since it had gotten so dark, of course it would be too late to call Daiki’s mom back and find out how to get to the hospital, but it wasn’t even nine yet.

“I mean it’s a little late, and it’s kind of a strange question, but it’s not too late,” Paul murmured to himself and his passengers.

“Did you say something, Honey?” asked Barbara. She turned from where she sat on the couch watching a game show. A television sat in its nook in an entertainment center set up next to the fireplace. The TV guide lay on the coffee table next to today’s newspaper. Barbara was a woman in her sixties with glasses on a chain and short, dark hair flecked with silver. She had a lighter complexion than her grandson. In that regard he took after his father. Barb and Floyd had kicked out their young daughter Deborah when she’d gotten pregnant, then taken her back just long enough to get the baby. They wouldn’t even speak to her boyfriend, Uriel, except to tell him to get off their property. That was eighteen years ago.

“Just talking to myself, Gramma,” replied Paul.

“Did you have fun at your friend’s house?” she asked.

“I did. We played games and hung out in his room, then we had dinner. His sister is visiting from college and one of my other friends was there, too.”

“That sounds lovely, dear. What are your friends’ names again?”

“Hyun, and the other friend who was there was Calvin.”

“I don’t think I ever met Calvin.”

“You have. You just always seem to forget his name when you see him.” Paul looked back at the clock. “I’m going to call another friend before it gets too late, Gramma.”

“Well gosh, it’s already almost nine! Can’t it wait until tomorrow?” she asked.

“No, Gramma.”

She frowned. “Oh, I remember Calvin now. When I was young they weren’t naming little girls ‘Calvin.’ That was strictly a boy’s name. But there’s Billies and Jamies and Jackies out there now of all sorts, so you never can tell. Just isn’t a very pretty name, if you ask me.”

Paul nodded, sighed, and got up to go call Rei. Barbara continued talking about names until she trailed off and looked to the television screen. “What is ammonia!” she guessed.

“Hello?” greeted Rei. “This is Dr. Rei Cooper.”

“Hello. I’m sorry for calling so late. This is Paul again. I called earlier today.”

“Oh, yes. I remember. Daiki still isn’t back yet.”

“Yeah. Um, could you please tell me what hospital he’s at?”

---

The parking lot had gotten bumpy with tree roots pushing up the asphalt. Paul found a spot and walked around until he found the entrance to the general lobby.

“Visiting hours are over, son,” an old man at the desk informed him.

“Oh, sorry. I’ll go,” apologized Paul. “Give me just a minute.” He looked at the directory posted on the wall on a large, dark brown plaque. “Where would coma patients be?”

“The ICU, but you’ll have to come back in the morning. Visiting hours are from eight AM to five PM.”

Paul nodded. “Alright. Thank you. Sorry to bother you.”

He left back through the double doors and the secondary set of double doors just past them, and began to circle around again to find another entrance. Wet asphalt reflected streetlights in pebbly vertical stripes. Small shrubs grew from curbed islands of beauty bark and plastic erosion netting. No continuous sidewalk marked the circumference of the hospital, so Paul picked his way between bushes from one parking lot to the next. After wondering for some time, he noticed a couple caregivers taking a smoke break. As he watched, they put out their cigarettes and walked together back in. He slipped in just after them then ducked down a hallway into a bathroom just as they looked behind them. The bathroom had a handrail, a red cord hanging to the floor, and a little door in the wall between this room and the laboratory for urine samples. He combed his fingers through his hair to work out nerves and tangles, then slipped back out into the hall. Paul muttered the floor number he needed to get to under his breath and found the elevators.

Somebody came out of the elevator pushing a cart loaded with food trays. The man gave Paul a curious look, but Paul just nodded in greeting and pressed the button to shut the elevator doors before the man could ask any questions. He could feel his pulse in his fingertips and lips, and wasn’t sure if all of the weightless sensation was due to the elevator or if some of it could be blamed on the thrill of yet another infiltration. Daiki thanked him and encouraged him from inside his head, which Paul’s lips mouthed as he tried not to actually talk to himself aloud. The mirrored walls of the elevator reflected back a strange doubling of his reflection, slightly blurred and not quite right, and a bluish gleam from no clear light source. He laughed nervously, then got off at the floor. Nurses and other medical staff hurried about their rounds. Radios gave muffled pieces of conversation from where staff had clipped them to their scrubs or pockets. Paul kept his eyes down and moved from room to room, peeking into each open door. Machines beeped, a janitor mopped up bodily fluids, a nurse sorted medication into little paper cups, and everybody was in a hurry except for the nurses at the central nurse station with their coffees and their computers.

“Excuse me, who are you?” asked a woman with dark brown skin, Indian features, and a white lab coat.

“I’m. I’m. Um.” He was not a good liar, not when he had to fabricate something instead of just leaving out information.

“I think you need to leave,” she concluded. “Will you go yourself, or -” Her pager went off. She cursed and radioed security. “Stay right there,” the woman ordered and hurried off.

Paul nodded and stayed where he was until she turned her back. Six rooms later he saw a pale face with black bangs out cold in a bed. “That’s me,” he whispered and slipped inside. A machine displayed pulse, oxygen level, and other statistics Paul had no frame of reference for. An IV fed fluid into Daiki’s arm. He wore a pale green hospital gown, with the thin, white woven blanket pulled up to his armpits, arms laid out at his sides atop the covers. He had a bruise on his face from where he’d hit the floor.

“Nice to meet you,” Paul whispered and laid his hand on Daiki’s cheek. The pulse monitor beeped faster and Daiki’s eyes popped open just as a cool shudder ran through Paul’s spine.

Daiki looked at Paul and smiled weakly. “Thanks.”

“You both there or am I going to hear from the dead girl in a minute?” Paul asked.

“We’re both here,” Daiki assured and stretched his fingers out, feeling out the sensation of control over his own limbs again. “We’re not separating any time soon. Or probably ever.” He yawned. “Fuck it’s good to be back in myself again. You ever need anything, anything, ever, just ask.” Daiki tried to sit up but got dizzy.

“Alright, man. I just need to get back out of here. Take care,” Paul replied and gave Daiki a big, crooked smile before escaping back out the door and speed walking toward the elevators.

The heavy noise of Romeo’s music overpowered the pleasant patter of rain outside Scott’s most recent digs. He’d had to flee the mansion he’d set up camp in a few years ago, and now took up shop in a condemned building downstairs from the Spider Guy. The Spider Guy, fellow squatter, liked to leave trails of string all over the place in radial patterns, and his room smelled of canned tuna. Their neighborly associations remained pleasant so long as they largely did not interact except to bring Spider Guy groceries. Ostensibly they called him Spider Guy because of the string, but people didn’t volunteer the story behind the nickname and Daiki didn’t ask. At the moment the music drowned out the crawling noises and muttered monologues from above.

“Turn that down before Spiders starts banging on the banister with his bat,” warned Isabel.

“Can you get the knob for me?” Romeo Rosemary asked her.

Isabel obligingly turned the boom box down to a more reasonable level. A wash of precipitation hushed the edges of the music. Sometimes a car winding through the side streets splashed through a pothole. Romeo, a middle aged lesbian and tattoo artist with a parlor somewhere a few blocks away. A legit tattoo artist, she wasn’t the one giving stick-and-poke V’s on the backs of the new Vipers’ wrists, but rather a friend of Isabel who’d agreed to do a house call. Isabel had assured her the kid was eighteen, and teenagers all looked like babies to Romeo so she couldn’t really tell that he was two years younger than her friend claimed.

The kid bit his palm to keep from moaning as she penned in a centipede crawling up his spine from just above his ass crack to the nape of his neck. He had shaved his hair, leaving only unruly black bangs and a scalp of dark fuzz. Daiki lay there with his shirt off wearing black cargo pants with a riveted belt and side straps belted with D-rings sewn periodically down the sides. A shot bead necklace clinked against the spikes on a leather collar, and he’d converted striped socks into armwarmers by cutting off the toes and cutting a hole for his thumb. That last accessory was Duria’s idea. She just really liked wearing socks on her hands. They bunched around the bracelets on his wrists.

“Why are you so determined to stay silent?” Romeo asked Daiki.

“I don’t want to make you uncomfortable at your job,” the kid replied.

A part of him, or a fellow resident of his physical form, bottled a teakettle scream. Duria did not appreciate that Daiki had chosen an area so densely packed with nerves for getting repeatedly stabbed with ink. Daiki, on the other hand, felt quite glad (for personal reasons) both of the tattoo and that he lay on his stomach. This was just the first session of what was going to be a pretty big project. This centipede’s body segments stylistically resembled vertebrae. After the black outline had healed up, he wanted Romeo to color it in reddish orange fading to black on the legs. It would take hours upon hours. Duria absolutely hated it, but ultimately conceded that Daiki’s body was his own. She may have found herself welded to his living soul and unable to depart from his body, and unable to opt out of the agony of this tattoo, but she grudgingly accepted the price of moving in with a masochist.

“Whatever. I don’t care,” Romeo remarked about the potential moaning.

Daiki whimpered then clamped his teeth back onto his hand, teeth sinking into the knit material of the armwarmer. Romeo snickered and wiped away some of the blood.

He had earned the cost of this tattoo with a year of going to different Vipers’ lodgings with a small group of Vipers: washing dishes, making dinners, and delivering groceries. He’d never have gotten the wherewithal to do something like that by himself, but they’d thrown him into a group of other teenage volunteers who looked after housebound Vipers and their friends and relatives. Whether chronic illness, injury, major depression, or some disability, it wasn’t any of his business why. The group he’d gotten thrown into seemed to be a clique almost all their own.

The one who spearheaded the house calls was herself disabled: Tievassa, a woman on crutches with a service dog. Daiki didn’t ask what service the dog provided because it seemed rude to pry into her medical needs. There was one other boy aside from Daiki: Dew, a jealous and catty guy who led the grocery expeditions. Daiki had caught glimpses of a skeletal tattoo on Dew’s back and wanted something like that for himself. Tulip did bookkeeping and networking on top of housekeeping. She seemed really sweet until Daiki overheard her gossip with her friends. Her best friend Fern kept quiet much of the time. Fern had a witchy fascination with teeth and bones, and a pet jumping spider at home. She was always taking the spiders out the door in a cup but taking no mercy on ants. While never quite letting Daiki into their clique, they didn’t direct their mean streak at Daiki to his face. He didn’t want to know what they had to say about him behind his back because his pain tolerance was only physical.

They had confined their group to groceries and housekeeping, but brought Daiki on to cook meals since none of them cared for cooking. When Isabel had gone over her bookkeeping and tallied up what minimum wage applied to all those hours of personalized care would have earned him, the tattoo didn’t seem all that expensive a reward. It beat actually paying him.

“So, I hear you are a pretty good cook,” Romeo mentioned.

Daiki turned his head to lay on the other ear and look at this artist. “Thanks!”

She had short, brilliantly blue hair with traces of green, sharply winged eyeliner, matching blue lipstick, and a plethora of piercings to complement the largely geometric patterns of tattoos stemming from her jawline downward. She wore layers of sleeveless tops with plunging necklines, a denim patch vest, and shiny black leggings that laced up the sides.

“You’re also not subtle about looking down my shirt,” she added.

“Sorry,” Daiki apologized quickly and turned his head back the other way.

“Apology accepted. What do you like to make?”

“Curry, stew, fried rice, bread and rolls, chicken soup, molasses cookies, shortbread cookies, baked fish fillets (especially salmon), roasted or sautéed vegetables -”

“Whoa whoa whoa. Wow...so, what kind of bread do you make? Banana bread?”

“Well, I can do quickbreads. But I like to do your basic leavened bread with quick yeast, some warm sugar water, a pinch of salt and several cups of flour, an oiled bowl…”

“Damn. When they said you cooked good and told me you’re just like some eighteen year old I thought, oh like canned soup and box rice with the sauce powder mix, something you can whip up in twenty minutes,” Romeo told him.

Daiki measured his breathing for a few beats then replied, “I make whatever they want to eat and have ingredients for, or Dew does a store run to grab whatever ingredients they can afford. I’m cool with doing a tater tot casserole or mac ’n’ cheese or canned tomato soup, it’s all good. I mean I can’t eat the tater tot casserole or the mac ’n’ cheese or the canned tomato soup because of the cheese and milk, but I can prepare it and it’s not for me, anyway.”

“Rock on.”

“But when I have the stuff for the things I really like to cook, that’s what I like to make. Not the casserole, but the other stuff I listed.”

“Right.” She leaned in closer and stuck her tongue out just slightly as she focused.

Daiki suppressed a whine. He’d been trying to converse in a regular speaking voice but it took a lot of effort and he kept pausing to hold his breath or bite his hand. Romeo found it kinda cute but wasn’t into people of his age bracket or gender.

“What’s your favorite food?” she asked.

Sandwiches, chimed in Duria. Especially cheeseburgers. Daiki sighed through his nose then paused to swallow and think past the pain and the burger imagery.

Would it be too obvious to get another look at her cleavage? This cougar is STACKED.

Yes, Duria, it would be very obvious. I’m trying to think so I can carry a normal conversation and not be a horny little creep.

Fine, think then.

“Tom kha gai. I don’t know how to make it, though.”

Romeo made a listening noise and sat up to drink from her water bottle. “Cool.” She didn’t want to let on that she didn’t know what that was. “I like burritos from the taco truck up on King St. Spicy shredded pork burrito.”

“I haven’t been there before.”

“You should go! It’s delicious and doesn’t even cost much at all. Get a horchata.”

“Okay,” squeaked Daiki.

He shut his eyes and focused on his breathing for a few minutes. Romeo wiped away more blood and hummed along with her music. Spider guy ran back and forth a few times, created some kind of heavy thump, then quieted down to a monologue muffled through the ceiling. Isabel watched from where she sat. She’d been having a few beers with a woman in her late thirties with long, curly copper hair salted with blonde-white in the coppery frizz. The woman had a cigarette hanging off her lip and wore bluejeans with a hammer holder strap, a white t-shirt with the sleeves rolled up, hearing aides, and a simple nickel chain necklace. She went by Sparrow, and she did the stick and poke wrist tattoos.

“So your papa burns chicken nuggies; your older sister lives on takeout and microwave dinners. Who’d you learn how to make bread from? Who taught you curries and molasses cookies?” Sir asked.

“My mom. I moved in with her about the time I started high school,” explained Daiki. “And Winter moved in too, even if my mom isn’t hers. Mom’s adopting her.”

Sir nodded. “Is she nice? Your mom?”

“Why, are you trying to get with my mom?”

Sir shrugged. “Maybe. If she’s a good cook. You might have to start calling me Mama.”

Sparrow snorted.

“Wouldn’t that be a little weird when you’ve already been with Miyako?” Daiki asked.

“I’ll survive weird. Just don’t tell her if you don’t want her feelings hurt.”

He began to doubt Isabel was joking. Daiki couldn’t see her from where he lay, not without turning his head, and if he did that he’d mostly see Romeo leaning over him from her stool. Duria sighed wistfully. Normally she wouldn’t have continued aging after she died, but trapped as she was in Daiki’s body she “lived” out day to day existence as much as he did. This also complicated Duria’s mental image of herself, since she hadn’t seen herself in a mirror or seen a picture of herself in years and the body she occupied did not look anything like her. At this point her body had long since been cremated so the only thing that looked like her was a fireplace.

“Your skin is swollen and pushing the ink back out,” Romeo commented. “I think it’s time we put a bookmark in this and come back to it after you’ve healed a bit.”

“Sounds good,” agreed Daiki. Duria’s relief came through in his voice.

“You did great, kid. You know we can take little breaks during sessions if you need to,” Romeo reminded him.

“Yeah…” Daiki was not ready to get up just yet. He tried to think of unsexy things, like Isabel dating his mom, or the process of making casserole. “Give me a minute.”

“What for?” Sparrow asked.

His ears turned red but he shrugged and said, “Nothing. Just comfortable.”

“Too comfortable,” concluded Sparrow, smirking. “Little freak really likes the needle.”

Sir laughed and got up to try to roll Daiki over. He adamantly clung to the table and blushed more fiercely, wishing he was better at lying or perhaps heavier so she couldn’t turn him so easily. Sparrow started to guffaw and Romeo rolled her eyes as she begun to clean up.

“Stop! I can’t help it!” Daiki protested. “Fuck you.”

“Don’t leave yet; I gotta cover it,” Romeo told him. “The tattoo, that is.”

He sat in his embarrassment and waited obediently. She washed the tattoo off and taped plastic wrap over it. “Leave this on for at least a few hours and don’t take any baths. Here’s a care sheet. Don’t scratch it or scrub it. Put that lotion you keep by your bed to a better use and moisturize your tat. Only if it’s unscented, though. See you in a week or two?”

“Yeah. Thanks.” He kept his eyes down, put his shirt on, and walked quickly from the room, down a narrow staircase, and into a small warehouse. Amid the old junk lying about, Scott had set up a living area with a camp stove, a folding cot with a sleeping bag, and left other signs of life such as playing cards and a radio. Daiki had to watch that he didn’t step on a rusty screw or broken glass. Sawdust sprinkled the cement floor.

Duria paused and studied Scott’s things from a distance. “Want to go – underwater?” she asked. Usually she didn’t speak directly in her own words since, like now, it didn’t make sense.

“Let’s look,” agreed Daiki. He began a slow perimeter of the room. Romeo’s music came through thinly from upstairs. There weren’t any windows, so the hush of the rain hardly made it through. Daiki didn’t know where Scott was now. The music got louder when they approached a place where the ceiling had fallen away. They could see rusted pipes, stains and mold, and layers of construction material neither Daiki nor Duria knew anything about.

Graffiti coated what was left of the walls. A mess of tarps, buckets, chairs, cinder blocks, newspapers, and vermin feces filled the floor. There didn’t seem to be anything on this side of the room, so Daiki slipped out under a rolling loading door through overgrown crab grass and opportunistic maple saplings. He emerged onto the wet, cracked asphalt of an uneven parking area, hardly even a lot, with a disused loading area, dumpsters, and staircases attached to adjoining buildings. Just past the loading area, a staircase carved into the ground led to an unremarkable dark green door. Unsurprisingly, when he tried the doorknob it didn’t budge. Water pooled at the bottom of the stairs in iridescent puddles that smelled of motor oil and piss. A porch light on a neighboring building flickered.

Daiki leaned against the damp masonry and shut his eyes as the ghost tangled with his soul slipped through the wall, leaving him cold and listless. Duria couldn’t fully detach from him, but she could, with effort, wander a ways at the cost of his ability to function. Inside, Duria found a dusted, swept corridor with a dim, naked bulb flickering above her. Aside from the same sort of water damage, this little basement looked pristine compared to the campsite up in the warehouse. Moving down the hall, the taffy stretch between her and Daiki’s body groaned in protest. She wouldn’t be able to move much further from his core. But down here someone’s breathing and shifting disturbed the stillness. The breathing had a wet, muffled quality to it, a mouth breathing around an obstacle. If she could go just a bit farther into the room, she would be able to see who breathed in confinement. Just...a...bit...The soul rubber band tossed Duria right back into Daiki’s body. He gasped and stepped forward away from the wall coughing and wheezing, and rested his hands on his knees. He didn’t breathe a word of reproach for her expedition, but waited to absorb what she’d seen on the other side of the door.

“Do we know of anybody who can pick locks or break into locked rooms?” he asked himself. Miyako stole but didn’t do any breaking and entering. Sid did recruitment and not much else relevant to the Vipers racket. Nobody in the house call clique seemed to do any breaking and entering, and while he’d met the housebound people they catered to, he didn’t get to know them very well. He knew Maggie liked scrambled eggs and not fried eggs, but not scrambled eggs with cheese or other ingredients. He knew Jamal was “allergic” to vegetables but liked a burger just piled with onions and enjoyed fruit. He had no idea if Maggie could pick locks or if Jamal could kick like a mule to break a door in.