Late Night Bumps & Subway Jumps

[Gum do Mugu]

Noon straightened up to hand his pass to the inspector. After scanning the QC code, the railway official handed the document back and smiled sheepishly. Reylson wondered, and assumed, that the ticket inspector he’d been exchanging pleasantries with for the last four years had seen the news report that morning.

From the inspector, Noon’s attention switched to the cab. There were two drivers in there, and both looked back at the well-dressed young man with a sombre sort of nod. “I guess everybody knows,” Reylson mouthed to himself; his whisper-quiet words were masked by the clickity clack of the rails. He felt like the train, glued to the tracks no matter what. That’s when his empathy kicked in and he realised their attention was a salute to solidarity rather than raw pity—the Ayenee Capital City Rail Link had also announced impending cuts.

“Jeez,” he mumbled, “I guess the whole city is in decline.”

[Gum do Mugu]

Noon bailed off the train just before midnight. His railway ride ended, abruptly, in the city centre; a punk kid had dragged a bedbug-ridden couch onto the line. And so, a shit day got ten times shittier. The termination of his train left him stranded downtown, surrounded by late night shoppers and bar hoppers.

He knew it was narcissistic, but he was somehow offended that they could go on with their lives while his life was under attack.

“I guess I’ll walk the rest of the distance.”

Capitalism’s neon success faded into the distance.

It was still raining.

[Gum do Mugu]

Back at the corp, he’d been part of the propaganda department. Noon whipped up the blinds to take in the late night vibes of his middle class contemporaries. Most of them, he thought, were probably asleep. Real people, just like him—he considered their guilt and their innocence, and drew parallels with his own guilt and innocence.

His conclusion? He came to it with a sigh and a slouch, he’d taken another of those obtuse angles. Prone and alone, he admitted to himself, “I guess I deserve this.”

In his mind, he played the role of prosecution, while the defence was totally out to lunch. He remembered, glassy-eyed, how he’d been responsible for an ad campaign painting Reese Jarrek as a philanthropic hero! Noon knew, though, that he most heinous crime was silencing the media after Sledge Rivers (intentionally) released his lab-created super virus. Guy Karde, of course, he was a maniac of equal measure—Noon Reylson blamed Section: One for destroying a residential block, when Karde’s urban warfare was really to blame.

“But, did I have any other choice?”

That lie was getting kinda difficult to swallow.

[Gum do Mugu]

Noon peered into the establishment. Face pressed against the glass, he looked child-like and shameless.

The breakfast place, positioned at the root of the seaside pier, was prepped to serve and waiting to fill hungry stomachs. A waiter propped his elbow on the counter and smiled—life on the beach had weathered his grateful and weary face. Every employee was smiling, Noon noticed. He was jealous of them and their bold decision to make ends at the beach.

Ayenee Capital City was gone. Fuck it.

Worst of all though: the food was "good as fuck" and he didn’t have a penny left to get something. Without monthly ZCorp cheques, he’d fallen behind. The last of his savings had gone into his hotel room.

Noon pulled his mug from the windowpane and squinted along the length of the pier.

“That’s a longer walk than I remember.”