The Line

[MalReynolds]

Auger’s Bar tended to be my stoop more than any other place in New City. The back room had socialites and cards, the front had hard liquor and some scum – not the crew I run with, but of the same type. My guys, they all tended to flock to Hennessy’s on the upper decks. Made them feel like they were men of stature, which they clearly were not. Any time you’re named after one of your descriptors, you should know you haven’t quite made it at that point. Ask Patches. Or Gold Tooth.

I tend to go by my Christian name – which is a double edged sword. I preferred if people would call me Marcus. But I tend to get “Mark” more than anything else – which happens to be a physical descriptor of mine. It made me wonder for a long time if I was to be relegated to the lower class because of my name – but I decided I wouldn’t let that hold me back. Some guy, brilliant, from what I’ve read, wrote a few thousand years ago that roses under the guise of tulips would still smell just like roses, only they’d be called “tulips” and that would be that.

Auger’s, though, the front was filled with “Scars” and “Dents” and “Black Shoes”. You throw an adjective into the air, you’d get people looking up, thinking you were trying to summon them.

But in the back room, that’s where the “Jills” and “Franks” and “Michaels” congregated to throw away money. It was a high class as you can get for going to the lower deck. It was fairly low key.

I thought that maybe one day I could get to the back room. Drop fat stacks of Credits and just live my life by the skin of my teeth.

-

A figure from my past trounced in to Auger one day. I swore Danny had been dead a long time – I hadn’t seen him in such an age that I had to look twice. Danny used to be an outspoken public speaker. If you gave him a corner and a cause, he’d give you a crowd full of support. Like most people with a gift like this, he abused his. It went to his head. All of a sudden, he wouldn’t help you spread your message. His was the only one that mattered. Maybe because he wasn’t helping other people, he fell. People stopped listening to him, because it wasn’t Danny talking. It was the beast inside. The Id.

Danny had always been a handsome man. I myself am five-foot-eleven-inches. Danny was a few taller than me, and his jaw was much more formed, as if chiseled out of oak. He always took good care of his body – “What’s a voice without a frame to match?” he used to challenge to me. I didn’t have a voice or a body, so I didn’t ever feel prudent to answer.

His looks had not diminished in the five or so years since I had last seem him. The only difference was a prominent scar that ran from his left eye down to his cheek. He didn’t see me at first. He walked over to the polished bar and unslung a bag from his back, sitting on the stool, his shoulders heavy. He muttered something to the bar tender, who reached out and grabbed a bottle of golden liquid.

I pushed myself back from my table, putting a cigarette out, and moving to the bar. I tapped him on the shoulder. He slowly raised his head, his eyes trying to register my face. After a few seconds, I saw a gleam of recognition in his eyes.

“Marcus?”

I nodded. “Danny.”

“You’re in Augers,” he said. “That must mean you’ve made it.”

I shook my head. “No. I’m in the front room. I just hate the way Hennessy’s smells. Plus, the closer I am to my goal…”

“What have you been doing?”

“Not much,” I shrugged. “Some petty crime. Me and my guys, we’ve been trying to break in to some of the bigger racket. Don Francisco stuff, but no matter what, we can’t seem to get his attention. I’m beginning to think I’m going to be a front room guy my entire life.”

“It’s not a bad place to be,” Danny said, sitting up and grabbing his drink. “The front room is a respectable place.”

“Yeah, but Don Francisco – he’s where it’s at. Running Auger’s, keeping the proletariat happy. I hear he runs at least six Machines.”

“Oh, yeah? A whole six?”

“That’s a lot for one person to manage. You hear people starting up Machines, and they have crew revolts within a day. And Francisco has six, Danny.”

“Seven. He launched a new gambling ship last week. You’re behind the times.”

“I met with Jordan Jeeves. He didn’t say anything about another ship.”

“Maybe ol’ JJ is out of the loop, Marcus. You can’t trust people all the time like that.”

“I know. I have to cut some of my crew, too. They’re getting… Rowdy.”

Danny laughed. “Really? I thought you always, you know, had a handle on them.”

“Well, Bowl Cut keeps asking for more of our takes. We got about half a truckload of sneakers last week, and he wanted more than a sixth. It was half a truckload of goddamned sneakers, man.”

“Sneakers? Marcus, what the hell happened? You used to be a schemer and –“

“A dreamer, I know. I had to scale things back. I was living in a fantasy world. Dreams happen when you’re asleep, Danny. You can’t sleep all the time when you need to survive, right?”

He tossed his drink back and ordered another. “True. I just didn’t know how bad things had gotten.”

“I’m still allowed in Auger’s. So that’s a plus. Things haven’t gotten so bad yet…” I paused, contemplated ordering a drink. What was worse than Bowl Cut asking for a higher cut, was that I had given it to him, undercutting myself. I was sitting on an almost empty wallet.

“What about you, Danny? Where have you been? The last time I saw you, you were talking about… God, I can’t even remember.”

“Ah, I’ve been around. A little of this, a little of that.”

I pointed to his bag. “You’re living with your life on your back. Where have you been staying?”

“Oh, just, you know. Relying on strangers. Look, this has been really nice, really nice catching up, it has, but I have to go. I’m sorry.”

I smirked. “Oh, well. I’m sure I’ll see you around.”

“Sure,” he said, grabbing his bag and slinging it over his shoulder. He stepped out the front door, leaving a stack of credits on the counter. The barkeep brought his second drink, which I quickly downed. It burned something fierce, and I counted to five before heading for the door.

I watched as Danny rounded a corner and headed for a lift, which I followed. He was snaking his way up the entire building, towards the Line. In the past, I used to come to the Line and just stare and the perfectly square world. So many buildings, all the same height, all the same distance. It was like there was as second ground made for giants.

But I would mainly come to watch the Machines – the large flying monstrosities – some as big and tall as the buildings themselves, that would just pollute the sky.

When I hit the Line, I was sandwiched evenly between two worlds. The only thing in front and behind me was the uniform unending landscape of rooftops. Above, thousands upon thousands of flying machines that housed hundreds of thousands of people. They were the true elite. They were the true upper class.

I tried to watch them zoom back and forth. Some moved at a snails pace, some moved faster than I could see. It was a delicate ballet.

Dozens of people were making their ways around me, heading to the pathways across the rooftops that linked all the buildings together. I stared and watched Danny, as he stared at watched the sky.

Within a few seconds, I saw him reach into his pocket and press a button. A few seconds later, he was gone, evaporated, and put back together on one of the Machines.

-

I thought, very briefly, that perhaps he had been embarrassed to be seen with me at Auger’s, and that is why he left so suddenly. To live in a Machine is to live in a world unreal, unparalleled to those that live below. From everything I’ve heard, it is unimaginable.

I went back to my hole in the wall that night, green with jealous rage. My entire life I had been vying to become part of a crew that not only worked in the Machines, but could live in them. And Danny, Danny had some how gotten it without even batting an eyelash. What had he done to deserve it? He ruffled feathers. I worked – not only stealing a petty amount of sneakers or whatever I could get my hands on, for it simply didn’t pay enough. I worked in an office. I was a data entry clerk by day, amateur criminal by night and weekend. I sounded like a horrible cell phone plan.

My room was about the size of a prison cell, but it was what I could afford. There were people out there who had it much worse than I did. There were people who lived in rooms big enough for their beds, and that was that. I had a table that had a television, and a private toilet – admittedly, it was right next to my bed, but it was better than having to use a communal john.

I went back home that night, and laid down on my bed. My head hit the pillow, and I stared at my ceiling, the tracks that demonstrated where I could walk. Most tenement living had that design – the ceiling was around four feet, with an indentation for your head. The best I can figure, the buildings were never meant to be more than one floor tall, but when they added upwards, they kept the same structure. It would have been more cost effective at one floor – saving on the costs of ceiling and supplies to just have a track for your head to follow – but they kept it uniform. Which left an ugly rise in my floor, which I had frequently tripped over when I first moved in.

It led to many contrecoup – tripping, and bashing my head against the sides of the track. But it was easier than walking hunched over. No surprises.

-

I felt the hand clamp down over my face. My eyes did not shoot open. I did not want whoever was currently assaulting me of having the pleasure of catching me off guard. I wanted to play it cool.

It was Bowl Cut. Squirrelly little ass. One hand was over my mouth, the other was holding a blade. In concordance with his name, he had a terrible bowl cut.

“You’re cheating me out of a fair amount of money, Mark, and that’s – I don’t know – the audacity.”

I tried to speak, but it was mostly consonants. He pulled his hand back.

“Are you looking at where I am, Bowl?”

The next few seconds were a flurry of events. He drew his knife back, but then there was a loud noise, like someone flinging my door open, and then something warm over my face. Bowl jerked backwards, and fell to the ground, his head smacking against the toilet. There were four feet that I counted coming in to my apartment. The faces were obscured by the head track, but they were both wearing suits.

They pulled me out of bed, shoving me along.

When we reached the hall, I felt a sting on the back of my neck, and I tried, I really did try to keep my eyes open, but they were just so damn tired. It had been a long day, and… Well, I didn’t need to think about it much.

Dreams, they’re what happen when you’re asleep.

-

End part 1.

[whiteflame]

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