When I blink, I see Skarisa’s half head. Her skull, splintered by his bullet. She dances around in the milliseconds between my open eyes. 

If I close them, I see Chelsi. She’s sobbing, begging me to stop. 

Chelsi and Skarisa fuse together. A forked tongue, big tittied, snake eyed, mascara smeared, half skulled monster that laughs at me. It cries and it laughs. It thrusts its pelvis, urging me to eat. Urging me to kneel. To work. 

Devourer. 

I could always kill myself, but it would still follow me. 

Instead, I slam my head against the edge of a dumpster. The recoil sends my ache into distortion. I can feel the static screaming through my left side. My neck is hot. My brain is upside down. 

My pills roll between my fingers. There are only two left. Kaloaan will never get me more. 

But the pills will save me. 

That’s not what is going to happen. 

That is not what should happen. 

Which demon watches you through the eyes of the girl you masturbate to? 

The bullet rips through Skarisa’s skull, and then reverses, putting her back together, and then rips through her again. 

There is a shard of her in my pocket. It can haunt me. It should. 

When I slam my head against the dumpster once more, a ringing fills my ears. 

There we go. I can’t hear Chelsi choking anymore. 

But my eyes still work, so I can see her. I can see both of them. Their amalgamation. Chasing me. 

I am the king of illusions of grandeur. To think that amazing people would follow me in spirit because of one shitty thing I did. As if their life revolves around me. As if I exist. As if we are real. So go away. Leave. I’m not important, stop pulling at my eyelids. 

I could always kill myself. 

But they will still follow me. 

“There’s no fucking way…” says a familiar voice. 

My eyes crack open. “Salif?”  

There he is. Dark skin, hooked nose, short cut hair. He’s dressed in a black blazer, purple tie, dress pants and pointy shoes. “Fuck me, Kallix, you look like shit. Why are you bleeding? Did you piss yourself?” 

“You look like a waiter… in a shitty East Side hipster bar,” I grab the edge of the dumpster, trying to pull myself up. I let the pills fall into my pocket. 

“Yeah, that’s usually how you’re supposed to dress for a wedding, dumbass.” 

“Wedding?”

“Tauren’s wedding? Are you not coming?” 

“Oh fuck… that’s today?” 

“Yes it’s today. What kind of drug does this to you?” he asks. At first that feels hostile but then I feel his buried humor. “Sure as hell ain’t Bansilin.” 

“Tell me about it. Hey… you don’t have any… anything, on you? By any chance?’ 

“I’ve got a tycol painkiller and viagra. Take your pick.” 

“Both?” 

We both snort in laughter. I swallow the painkiller with puddle water. 

“Gimme your tie,” I say as we move down the road. 

“What? Why?” 

“Cuz we’re going to a fucking wedding, that’s why. Now pass,” I grab him. 

We tussle for a moment. Eventually I manage to wrangle the tie off him. 

“You think that’s gonna save your grimy ass? C’mon, you could’ve at least dressed up a bit, it’s freaking Tauren’s wedding.” 

“She’ll understand.” 

“What’s she going to understand?” 

“That I don’t own any other clothes.” 

“Would it kill you to own a shower?” 

“Probably.” 

“You ever get a job?” 

“Sure.” 

“Yeah?”

“Definitely. You’re mom’s been lonely as hell, so she pays me to-”

“Fuck yourself,” he clocks me in the shoulder, making me stumble. 

“That too. Fucking yourself properly is basically a full time job.” 

“I’m asking because I can hear the credits jingling in your pocket. Which three year old did you rob?”

“Three year old better be a CEO to get me this much cash.” 

“And you still can’t buy anymore clothes? You’ve been wearing that grimy hoodie since you were twelve.” 

“I mean it still works.” 

He cackles. “You say that like its a car.”

“Are you still working at that… place?” 

“Yeah, it’s been great actually. Boss got the plague so they’re looking for a replacement and I’ve got the best earnings this year.” 

“Which idiots are investing in you?” 

“It’s not me. They’re investing in projects. A crater in the Dunes just turned out to be full of rare minerals that usually only exist deep in the core, so the opportunity is massive. Also, deadass fossil fuels were discovered on this island way out of the Gap.”

“Fossil fuels? We’re really going back that way huh… haven’t raped the land enough?” 

“It’s the Dunes man, not a living being. There’s nothing out there anyway. You gotta-”    

“Wait, hold on,” I pause at the store we’re passing. 

Record shots.

I step inside, accidentally inhaling as I get blasted with disinfectant spray. Rows and rows of different media of music stacks the aisles. Hipsters with too much money who don’t know what to buy. Wide eyed teenagers with no money who know everything they want. 

“Bro, we’re going to be late,” Salif says, stepping in behind me. 

“I want to get her a present,” I say, beaming down the aisle towards the end. There’s a huge display case of record shots, everything locked behind plexiglass. My eyes scan the rows, searching for something that I know Tauren likes. Agh. Literally every time I’ve ever hung out with her, she plays me some artistic bullshit and spends half the time geeking about it. Why am I such a shitty listener? 

“Downtrend… I know she likes them,” Salif says from over my shoulder. 

My eyes find the vinyl case. Green graffiti sprayed over an elementary school playground. It reads, ‘The End is Dear’. Nice. “Sounds familiar,” I say, pressing the alert button. 

The attending bot rolls up, it’s emoticon face twisted into a disgustingly pleasant expression. I want to tear out it’s jugular wires and ram my knee through its display. Instead, I hand it fifty credits. It slides and twists the USB key and out plops a syringe in a branded glass canister. “Thank you for your purchase!” the bot says, gleefully. “Remember to sterilize all needles before use! Needle purchases in packs of three or greater grant you a fifty percent off discount when bought with all record shots, and if you-”

“Fuck off,” I mutter, pushing past it and back out the door. 

“Now we’re definitely going to be late,” Salif says, quickening the pace. 

“Did you even get her a gift?”

“We’ll say this is from us.” 

I’ve missed this guy. It’s rare to catch him nowadays between his job, his addictions and his family. Those rare occasions are worth it. I would say I wished to go back to the old days, when we would hang out doing heroin in his father’s garage, but I like seeing his face filled out and the light behind his eyes. He stops at an Elevator. “You’ve got a level ticket, right?” 

“Huh? Where is the wedding actually?” 

“The Strobe. Down on six.” 

“Fuck me.” 

“Alright well you’re a rich guy now so you can pay out of pocket,” Salif says, queueing the Elevator. 

I hear it rattle, racing up from the depths. It stops with a clang and hisses open, blasting a cloud of disinfectant. Again, I breathe it in, sending my lungs into a seizure. How does it still catch me off guard every time? Fuck’s sake.

We step in. The floor is sticky, probably from piss. Salif scans his card. I punch in the level and fork over six credits. Can’t do shit in this city without an account for everything. Bank account. Rail account. Elevator account. Surprised you don’t need an account to take a shit. 

The Elevator rockets off, as we hold on to the dangling handles on the ceiling. I rep out some pull-ups as we fall. Seven. Not terrible. 

It clangs to a halt, and the doors open. A crowd of insects in corporate attire swarm inside as we push out.

Six. Been a while. 

The surface is grimy, but here everything is coated with a thin film of soot from gas that seeps up from the refineries at Ten. Dinky, patchwork floodlights beam down from above, but like the ground, they’ve never been cleaned, so what little light escapes is dim and strained. 

The crowds are massive, boring down the central dome. Negative Six is structured like a pentagon, with a main dome in the center, creating a catacomb of workspaces, shops and apartments, all stitched together like an anthill. Around the hexagonal center are the main lanes, huge, crowded walking highways with the taller, flashier megastructures around the periphery. Everything is built on top of everything, and they all lean inwards as if drunk, threatening to topple over at the nearest tremor. 

Salif has already started. I chase after him, already growing accustomed to the smell of gasoline and smoke. A lizard vendor shouts at us from his kiosk. He holds up a skewer of deep fried chitin, barking his price. 

On my left, an impossibly round and bouncy woman with a preposterously tall wig scuttles up to me holding up a rack of bracelets. “A little something for your hubby then?” 

I wave her off. I can’t imagine Tauren’s aristocrat weasel boyfriend choosing to host the wedding here. 

There are a set of screens the size of houses, angled like cranes atop support beams and facing the road. I flinch for a second as I see Zorikan’s dead eyes staring down at me. His face is the headline. Terrorist attack on BlueLight police barracks. 

The screen switches to an interview with Firida, her massive radiator sunglasses glaring against the light. “Our response will be swift and specific. We already have the leads we need and we’ve got our best men working on it. Zorikan’s attack was aggressive but sloppy. He’s left us all the information we need.” 

“Is it true that you will be accepting aid and working with corporate force to crack down on the gang activity?” a hovering interviewer bot asks.

“No, not at all. For one, this is outside of corporate jurisdiction, and secondly we are more than capable of calibrating a response that is adequate. These gangs have been allowed to function for too long under corporate territory. This won’t be the case for very long.” 

“You hear about that? Crazy shit man,” Salif breathes. 

“Yeah.” 

“I mean its horrible that those officers died, but fuck, the dude is a badass.” 

“I guess.” 

“There we go,” Salif points. At the end of the lane, where the corner of the hexagon turns, is a gargantuan, shimmering concert hall. The Strobe. In a digital banner that spans the width of the building their names are animated into dance. Tauren Katsura x Bedsel Wesleyas. 

What a fucking name. 

We trace through the empty line ropes and give the bouncer our names. Stepping inside, I’m taken aback by the fresh air. It smells of lemons and mist, just like Tauren’s room.