Give cyclamens to those you never know, 

Purple hyacinth, for the past I can't not change,

Pink larkspur their dotted around, reinforces by chains

Chains of marigolds. 

Immigrants that came from all across Sileo vitae to Water Sunset were normally attracted by the advertisements. Advertisements of an open trading market, one half floating on water, the other half on land, with the best views of the sunsets in all of Sileo vitae, the widest range of Beings- a communal city, were all beliefs and religions were respected (sort of, not everyone got along- ha!), and blah, blah, blah.

But with every tourist and new resident, they all came to hate one thing. The parasites. To be specific, the electronic tiny parasites. Also known as, Glitch! The greatest, most best electronic tiny around, because she was famous in Water Sunset! Well… famously hated, but who was Glitch to deny attention? 

She was best known for her glowing pigment, a bright electronic yellow that in the wild would have killed her within a week, but made her near impossible to catch or spot in the neon electrical city. It also meant she was quite careless, but they were yet to catch her so she didn't care. 

“HEY! Get off parasite!!!” Snapped the man that ran the floating store that Glitch was sapping energy from. He was a hybrid, they were common in communal cities like this, with large curving wings of tightly knitted scales and long hooved feet, short fuzzy antlers peeking through curls of black hair. Glitch lazily opened one eye to flip the man off. 

“A girls gotta eat, boomer.”

“GET OFF MY ELECTRICAL BOX.” snapped the man, and Glitch made a crackling noise as chemicals were sprayed in her general direction. Her long cable tail tipped with a socket unplugged from where it was plugged into the power outlet, and she let electricity crackle along her body. 

The man sprayed that disgusting pest-be-gone spray again, and Glitch inhaled a bit, gaggling on it and stumbling to her feet. Ughhh, it made her head spin. Rude son of a bitch. I’m definitely coming back to steal all your electricity. Another puff of killer chemicals were sprayed into the air and with that Glitch vanished, jumping down onto the strung up lights, scrambling across them in hope of reaching another stall. She nearly lost balance and fell off the thin wire with big bulky cylinder glass lights, down onto busy streets. The streets are no place for a Tiny. You could be stepped on, fall into an open fire. Or worse, you could get picked up or you could fall into the water. 

The world went hazy momentarily, and Glitch had to pause mid light string thing and breathed in slowly, trying to gain her focus. Tiny’s couldn’t swim, and Glitch was at the far end of the floating water born stalls, there were many, many, gaps in between the floating stalls, many gaps that Glitch could fall into. And drown. 

Fuck, shit. She forgot how easy it was to become dazed by the chemicals many of the stalls owned, to arm them against the electronic parasites, preventing them from sapping all the electricity that they fed on. Glitch, in daze and probably slowly becoming intoxicated, stared with fuzzy eyes at the ground below, warning her of the dangers. The streets are no place for a Tiny. No one can be trusted. If you trust a giant, you will be torn apart, kept as a pet or worse… Glitch shuttered. 

But she couldn't stay out in the open…… Beings moved like snails, shimmers, flicks and wisps of all the shades of every colour of the rainbow, pausing to look at stalls and converse with each other. There were slots in the warm amber wood for those pinned in the rivers or seas to pop up, to trade or buy. There were so many things, tails of scale or fur, webs or wings, sweeping spines and horns of all kinds. Some days she would curl up on a stall and watch all the families and different Beings, how the Stall owners would smile, talk to Beings that came to their stalls and they seemed so different to how they treated Glitch and her species.

Sometimes, Glitch would see other Tinys, black and brown and beige to blend in, but she would never go near them. You can't trust anyone. That was her number one rule. Glitch swayed, and her thoughts were sluggish and were rolling into each other, hands becoming loose on the wires. Shit…… Glitch’s body tilted, and then she was falling. Shit! Her tail lashed, coiled and now she was dangling by her tail over the casem of certain death. Her attention hyper focused on the large hooves and talons and feet that collided with the platforms, how many traps and chemicals were out, every single way she could die over and over replayed in her mind. SHIT!

Up and at them, now, go!!! She scrambled, or tried, loosely swinging. Hands snagged the cable and she put it into a death grip, clinging onto the height, the safety, and began to drag herself to the next stall. She had to heave herself up and over onto the roof, roll over to wheeze and shake from the chemicals. Fuck….. She struggled to stand, collapsing a couple times and topping over, and she swayed as she stumbled over the roof, tail hazardously following. A noise bubbled in her throat, and a small part of her mind was surprised that she was laughing. 

Ohhhhhh fucking shit!!! She laughed, and then whooped, thrusting her arms wonkily into the air with a large grin, and nearly tripped. What was she worried about? She could barely think, her mind was so fuzzy. The sun was bleeding the sky orange, red and yellow, the moon appearing with whirls of navy and purple, Glitch giggled hysterically, nearly falling off a roof as she looked up at the sky. “Helloooooo~! Good, old, friend!” She slurred, bubbles of hitches of snorts and chuckles. 

The sky did not respond, but she took the absence with a stride. “Allllllllll most got caught today!” She continued, hazardously swinging limps as she stumbled along barren rooftops of tile. “Again. But, I live to see you another day~!” There was a moment of silence, and Glitch’s smile fell. “I live to see you another day.” She repeated in a mumbled, voice soft and weak. And yet you were the only one. The sky, the moon and all the stars seemed to whisper back.

The gas was everywhere. Curls of poisonous snakes, and the Beings fled, the shop owner and the customers. They were left, locked in cages to die. It was a trick of fate. A sick, sick trick of twisted fate that Glitch could escape the pet store. The latch to her enclosure wasn’t properly shut. 

She was forced to choose. She was forced to choose, wheezing, dying in that pet shop. 

Glitch silently stood there. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Nothing. Was everything nothing? Were they nothing??? She lifted her hand, pressed it to her chest, and moved her other hand to press the back of her skull, to her Life-Force. 

“Do it for us. You are something, you are the future, our existence. Go, be free.” 

She could feel her heartbeat, her Life-Force pulse. She was alive for them. Stick to the rules. Do it for them. 

“Fuck you.” She whispered to the sky.