You know how you might get excited to eat at a new place and you stuff yourself with food that tastes good in the moment but the morning after you swear you’re never going to that place again because of how much your stomach hurts? I didn’t know the feeling up until about four months ago. Anyways, disregard that pain, because the pain I was experiencing was ten times worse, and I would never blame Tien’s pho for killer cramps.
I groaned and struggled to get out of bed as my bones creaked, making me sound sixty without rejuvenation treatments instead of my real age of twenty four. As I made my way over to the mirror to take a look at myself in the morning, Century sent me an image of a man parting a large body of water. “I get everything but the bleeding, Century, that’s not even an accurate joke.” Flipping on the light, I lifted up my tank top to observe the damage yesterday’s job resulted in. The right side of my stomach, my right arm, and my right collarbone had gnarly bruises on them, the one on my abdomen worse than the other two. I reached for the soothing gel stashed in my cabinet and cussed quietly, checking the cupboard and cussing again at my forgetfulness. “The one thing you constantly need, and you forget to get a spare.” I sighed, threw my tank top off and walked back into the main room, taking a quick rest on the railing to take a look at my work in progress downstairs. “I don’t get how the Cavaliers manage such feats of automotive engineering, do you Century?” She shook her head from the cat bed I had gotten her. “Would be nice to see them around, get tips on making the new ride all the better.” The image Century sent me after my comment was of her, riding a bike while wearing a pair of shades and a slowly detaching Pompadour wig. “How would you even reach the handles, silly? You’re like two feet of condensed murder and sass!” She chirped and stuck one of her cables out at me in response. Looking down and shaking my head at the bruises, I went to get dressed and afterwards walked outside.
The moment my eyes adjusted to the bright light of an unexpectedly sunny March 31st they were met with billboards high on the megaplexes, all of them colored with a familiar tricolore of pink, blue and white. In between advertisements for surgeons, for loans, for stylists, for insurances stood numerous posters of models, changing the currently shown model at a steady pace. Each one had their trans status highlighted in uncomfortable ways, and each one sported a strange halo overhead. A halo I was noticing on a few individuals on the streets of Oddington, all of whom were wearing masks.
While I was intrigued, I had left my place for a specific purpose, and so I crossed the street and took the ten minute walk to reach Auntie Murphy’s clinic. I unconsciously waved at Zagreus while looking at the medicine aisle, but I followed the wave up quickly with a double take. He had a witch boy aesthetic to him today, his black hair reaching his ears, a few scruffy hairs on his chin, a big loose sweater with holes in specific places that showed the white undershirt he had on. I couldn’t see the rest of the outfit from where I stood, with the counter in the way, but I gave him a thumbs up. “Yeah, I think it works too.” His voice was cracking, so he cleared his throat before continuing. “Are you here for a check up or just supplies?”
“Ran out of pain gel. I need some for the nasty bruises I got yesterday.” I grabbed two bottles and brought them to the counter, taking out a cash stick on the way. “Hey, any idea about the whole masked angels thing happening outside?”
“I have no clue. I have only lived here for as long as you have, after all.”
“It’s Trans Day of Visibility.” Sarah’s voice came from the entrance, and when I turned to look at her she was leaning on it, one of those halos hovering over her head. “Surprised you two aren’t conveniently marked for bigots like the rest of us.”
“Probably because we’re technically not people? I don’t have a birth certificate to dramatically burn.”
“And I don’t have access to the invoice for me to burn that.” Zag contributed as his answer.
“So the masks are to make identifying us harder? Why aren’t you wearing one, Sarah?” She flexed her cyber arm in response. “Right, forget I asked.” My cramps decided then that it was the perfect moment to flare up again, and so I grabbed some heating pads from the cupboard and added them to my purchase.
“Years of sleeping in a car catching up with you?” Sarah asked, and I flipped her off with a smile on my lips.
“Period cramps, dipshit.” I was still smiling, and she knowingly nodded.
“I think I still have some tea for that. I barely even register mine so I never feel the need to brew a pot.” Sarah scratched her chin in contemplation and shrugged. Her cyber arm swiftly got used as a signpost to point to her apartment. “Do you want to come over? Corkscrew got me Wolf Princess yesterday, I haven’t watched it yet.”
“Yeah, sure, why not, the ads outside are way too obnoxious to deal with anyways, and I had no other plans.” Zag handed me a bag with my purchases at that moment, and with a final wave I walked past Sarah and started making my way up her stairs. Before I turned the corner, I saw Joseph walk in, and managed to overhear him ask if Zagreus had time to hang out. I wished him the best of luck. “Did you get to try Corkscrew’s pork when they had it?”
“I helped them make some slavic sausages I read about out of the organs and such. Pretty sure I kept a few in my freezer, right behind the vodka.” She hadn’t even bothered locking her door when she went downstairs, or closing it properly, since she casually squeezed past me and on towards her cupboard, looking through a bunch of jars. “Here we go, the one for cramps, yup still got plenty.”
“How do you keep getting your hands on actual tea leaves?” I sat down on her ridiculously massive bed, and Century curled up right beside me. I do mean ridiculously massive, four Josephs could fit on it comfortably and still have room for two Zagreuses. Zagrei?
“I watched over a seed delivery, the company literally couldn’t be providing their stock without me so I keep hanging that over their head to get some free samples.” She grinned conspiratorially. “Oh, and there was a raid on the caravan, some of the seeds got stolen.” She tapped her nose and got to brewing, it was almost hypnotic to watch her meticulously work, and it wasn’t until that moment that I realised the benefits of a metal arm without heat sensors in it.
“Who’d you implicate in the raid?” I leaned back on the bed, looking up, to see the ceiling covered in pin-up posters. In contrast to the ones outside, these ones looked comfortable and confident.
“The Journeymen that build those crazy elaborate bikes, they tend to hang around Dusklight out of town near the wind generators.” The egg timer she had set up went off, and she poured the tea into a rather cute mug with owls drawn on it. “Sorry I couldn’t find one with gryphons on it.”
I was thankful she hadn’t handed me the cup yet, both because it was steaming hot and because I would be spitting the tea out from her news. “The Cavaliers are here? Like, within reach here?”
“Should be, I didn’t take so much that the tea company would retaliate. They even helped me with stealing it.” She snorted. “Cavaliers, really?”
“We’ve got a flair for group names. Bonded, Cavaliers, Duelists, Lifted, Jackers, Fused, Forge Guards. Shit, though, I didn’t expect any of them to be near a town like Dusklight, especially after...” Century nudged my hand, forcing some pets out of me, but the image she sent me was of her hugging me. “I’m twenty two, Century, not twelve, you should update your image of me if you don’t want me calling you an old woman all the time.”
Sarah sat down next to me, she put the cup down on the coffee table in the process. “Especially after what, M?”
“I’m not ready to talk about it. No clue if I’ll ever be.” I sat up, and with care took a cursory sip of the tea while my free hand was busy scratching Century’s chin. “Shit that’s good. Okay, now we watch the movie Corkscrew got you.”
“Hope you’re okay with subtitles, they got it off of NiponTV’s servers.” Sarah got off the bed, and with experience plugged a drive into the TV that hung from the ceiling. It didn’t take too long for her to scroll through to Wolf Princess.
“Corkscrew’s gone international now, have they?”
“As if that was hard when there’s only two barrels to tap.” Sarah jumped onto the bed, crawled back to rest against the wall, and turned on the movie.
And while we were watching I finally applied the gel to my bruises. A break was exactly what I needed after a day like the last.
Hell yeah I'm really enjoying this snapshot series:3
Thank you for the chapter.