The alley was grey, just like the rest of this district. The sky couldn’t be seen past the tall buildings and even then the dark smog of industry squandered what hope there was left to see the clear sky or afternoon sun. Men and women of wealth and status never stopped here, they just drove or walked on by, hurrying to get to their next meeting, or to punch in their card, if they even had one. CEO’s and tycoonists sped by this district in shiny cars and hover vehicles, detesting the fact that they even needed to take this route.
Women and even a few strange machines covered in biogeneric flesh hollered at those walking, but most most of the blue bloods simply pulled their business hats over their noses and quickened their pace. One dusty man among the quickened paces of silk and cotton suits slipped into the grey alley.
His curly sandy hair was disheveled and dark rings were around his light green eyes. Stiff blonde stubble was starting to form on his cheeks and he wore bland clothes of almost generic make, as if he was an extra in the back of a movie scene. He wore old shoes and walked with a small nervous twitch, his body aching and his mind in withdrawal.
He quickly approached two men. One wore nice clothes although only better versions of the ragged man's relaxed jeans and shirt, and his brother next to him showed physical signs of birth defects, and his clothes definitely were put on by him, with one pant leg scrunched and the other not, and his shirt on backwards, a large spaghetti stain dominated most of the front.
“Sancho!” the sandy haired man, Jeremiah, said, his voice cracking. The man who stood taller than the others and wore the better clothes screwed his face as he retaliated, “hey man, why you gotta be calling me that? Don’t do that shit.”
“I he-heard what you did with Joe’s girl, man,” Jeremiah stuttered, a small twitch taking his face in a spasm for a moment. Jose folded his arms, not willing to admit anything, “jus’ don’t do that shit. Whatchu want?”
“He wants his mediciiiine,” Jose’s poorly dressed brother nearly squealed, rocking back and forth in place. Jose looked disgustingly over at his brother Eduardo, “he wants some joy is what he wants, I can smell it on this piss ant.”
“Why do you gotta be insulting me like you’re s-s-s-some kind of blue blooded prick?” Jeremiah exploded with a flustered expression. His eyes darted around wide and anxiously as he brought a hand up suddenly to scratch his arm rapidly, “ju-just give me the shit, m-man.”
“I don’t know man, this is some military grade shit, you’ll feel invincible, and you just might as well be,” Jose said flashing a small bag of blue pills. Jeremiah’s eyes widened and he reached for the bag. Jose pulled it back and grunted, “but it looks like to me you’ve had enough.”
“Just give me the joy!” Jeremiah shouted desperately, his voice deepening in frustration. Eduardo shivered uneasily, “just let him have it, Jose.”
“Shut the fuck up you retarded shit,” Jose snapped, “this prick still owes me, and above that, I’m not sure our pal here can take anymore.”
“I owe you noth-nothing!” Jeremiah started to pace, waving his hands around, “I fu-fucking paid you, I’m hu-hurting, just give me the damn pills!”
“Jose, please,” Eduardo started to beg. Jose slapped Eduardo across the face with a loud smack, “I’m the boss, shut the fuck up.” Eduardo stumbled backwards and whined.
“Hey!” Jeremiah raised a shaking finger as his red face twitched, “be fucking nice to your damn brother!”
Jose put his weight on the back of his feet and laughed, “you’re washed up Jeremiah, this shit has you by the balls. I’d be damned if I let some junkie prick tell me how to run my business.”
“Ju-just be nice to your brother,” Jeremiah growled weakly.
“Well what the fuck are you going to do about it?” Jose said with a huff. He spread his arms as if showcasing himself, folding the baggie in one hand, “you’re just some druggie with a dishonorable discharge, and I’m the man with everything you hold dear in a dirty fucking bag.”
“F-fuck you.” Jeremiah spat, sulking and sinking back at the words.
“Please stop fighting,” Eduardo pleaded.
“Ed shut the fuck up!” Jose yelled, pushing his brother to the ground. Eduardo fell like a sack of bricks, unable to catch himself, landing flat on his back with a loud exhale of pained breath.
Jeremiah fumed in the shadows and with a shaking fist he snatched a solid rock and rushed Jose. With a loud grunt Jeremiah slammed the rock into Jose’s temple, sending the drug dealer to the ground with a loud crack. Jeremiah puffed his chest in and out as he breathed heavily standing over Jose. Eduardo yelled loudly, tears stinging his eyes, “you killed him!”
Jeremiah dropped the rock and shook his head, a deep pang of grief shot his gut and worry peeled across his face, “no man- no, I-I was just trying to help is all.”
“He’s dead,” Eduardo weeped, “you killed my brother!”
“Nah I was just foolin’ he is fine, I’m sure,” Jeremiah winced, his own eyes starting to water as guilt sunk into his stomach. A red stream started to flow from Jose’s forehead and puddle on the asphalt of the alley.
“Go away! Go away!,” Eduardo said between loud sobs as he cradled Jose’s limp body. Jeremiah started scratching his arm furiously, bringing it to rash, and twitched his head to the side. He quickly snatched the bag of blue pills and defensively pressed them against his chest, looking frightened at Eduardo,a freezing chill creeping down his already frozen body.
“Take your medicine and go,” Eduardo persisted. Jeremiah kept scratching his arm, only moving to steal a small gun that had fallen from Jose’s back pocket during the scuffle. He twitched again and wiped a tear, “s-s-sorry.”
Jeremiah bolted from the scene, shoving the gun in his pants seat. As he ran towards the slightly more lit street side, his clumsy swollen fingers fought to open the small baggie, shaking the pills all about. As he reached the exit to the streets his fingers finally slipped between the folds of the bag, but with a loud rip and the small clattering of pills falling everywhere, the bag exploded.
“F-FUCK!”
He dove to the ground, despite the traffic walking by and started to desperately pick the tiny blue pills from in between the rough gravel in the asphalt. His fingers scraped and plucked the small drugs from the ground, popping the first few directly into his mouth with an intense gusto, whimpering to himself.
The dry pills stuck to his even drier throat, and he painfully forced them down with rough gulps. He sighed a relieved breath through a cotton ball mouth after swallowing three of the pills. A disgusted snort from a passerby caused him to shoot to his feet, shoving the reclaimed pills into his pocket, “hey! you got something to say, blue blood!”
The suited man had already walked by and Jeremiah exhaled a hot breath, the nervous rock in his stomach causing him to feel nauseous. He felt like the world was spinning faster and faster. His head went light and he bent over, holding his knees. He opened his mouth and started dry heaving. A few people walking by quickly juked around him with insults and comments. He wanted to yell at them, but his eyes went blurry with stinging tears as he continued to heave, gasping intensely for breath in between. His face turned scarlet and he felt like his eyes were going to pop out of his skull from the exertion. His lungs started to burn from the lack of air and after a few more heaves, he felt like he was about to suffocate to death.
Light headed and in pain, he twitched and spasmed. He fell to the pavement with a thud and started jerking every which way, convulsing and heaving. People stepped over him, and a few even threw things down on him. One woman dumped her ice coffee on his face as if it would help him, but then quickly hurried off in designer heels.
Finally the spasm stopped, and he the pain was gone. It was not only the pain that was gone, but the deep welled anger, and even the guilt. He felt numb, he felt nothing. All he felt was “joy”. His muscles felt invigorated, like he could lift a tractor trailer and bend it in half. A beaming smile shot on his face as he jumped to his feet a new man.
“Fuck them all who cares,” He said outloud, flipping off a passing CEO. His twitch was gone, and the rings around his eyes disappeared, revealing the face of a once ambitious young man. He started his walk shoving the coveted pills deeper into his pockets.
He stopped and spun around, pointing at a surprised business man, “you,” Jeremiah began, his voice strong and baritone, “and all your rich devil friends can go fuck themselves, this is MY town.”
“What’s your problem creep?” The man said taken aback before continuing his walk. Jeremiah waved a middle finger the man’s way, his buzz a little hurt. He shoved his hands in his pockets as he walked. His fingertips lightly played with the pills as he walked by window signs and posters talking about the ICCP, and how great they are. Jeremiah scoffed to himself, feeling human once more now that his system was satisfied,
blue bloods, ICCP, they are all the same, high and mighty, shitting on the real people.As he walked by a beggar he dropped what he thought was a coin into the man’s cup, but it may have very well just been one of the bolts that jingled in his pockets. He sighed happily and continued his walk. He felt great, like there was nothing in the world that could take him down.
Eventually he found himself by the tower, the mask of an engineer over his once withdrawn face, and a box of tools in his hand. With a hidden smirk he secretly popped one of the blue pills underneath his mask and shook with delight as it slid down his throat. Time to get to work.
-------
The seat was rather uncomfortable under Jeremiah's butt. Latched safely to a barely cushioned seat, he was also dressed in a microfiber and metal suit built to protect engineers from the vastness of space as well as supply oxygen and mild protection from any object that might accidentally lacerate or puncture the working man.
Despite the claustrophobia of the confined space with only dark plain walls to comfort him as he sat alone in a transport vessel, the effects of the joy he had slipped minutes before suiting up had rendered him numb to the usual anxieties that accompanied space travel.
Behind a thick engineer’s mask he was smiling eagerly as exciting energy crawled across his skin in an almost pleasurable tingle. The ship was vibrating violently as it whirred and clunked preparing to be thrown through some worm-hole. The pilot had explained it to Jeremiah but as an engineer he was already familiar with how these things worked, luckily as well, since Jeremiah was too excited and eager from the pill to pay much attention.
If the thick suit had not covered his entire body, the vascularity of his drugged form or dilated eyes might’ve tipped the pilot off to his intoxication, but thankfully he was simply shrugged off as ambitious.
The force of gravity pushed on his face as the entire vessel suddenly shot forward without much warning, and in seconds it halted abruptly and as silently as it had shot forward. If it was not for the safety latch of his seat, Jeremiah was sure he would have been launched right into the wall.
The ship had jumped, he was sure of it, and now he was in the docks, and even the hands of a new employer. He wasn’t too sure why he was transferred; his record was clean and above average, if the nasty rumors about him weren’t taken into affect. Despite his addiction, he figured he has done a decent job at keeping it out of view from his superiors, and yet here he was, thrown to a new employer, like a common tool that had out done it’s use.
He would have normally felt like a hand-me-down, and possibly might’ve even been offended. However, the sheer amount of light and fluffy joy that clouded and kissed his mind was too thick and intoxicating to see past.
Even as he stood waiting for the doors to open, he felt his skin move pleasingly against the clothes he wore under his suit. Every small scrape or bump, even the whispers of the light fibers touching him felt like kisses from angels, and his head swam in a pool of wine, drunk on ecstasy.
The door opened and a man started to ask him to come with him. He couldn’t quite hear the man from all the way in heaven and instead the words fell on his ears like he was underwater. The sea of intoxication had taken him in it’s warm embrace. His mind knew what to do despite his numb state, and with some very energized and animated steps forward, he followed the man.
Every step was too slow, he felt. He needed to run, he needed to strip his suit and just run. The world was closing in, and his legs were full of power and energy. He needed to stretch and just burst from the confinement and run, run like a wild gazelle. His heart pounded with adrenaline as his thoughts pumped his mind and body into a heated excitement. Washes of warmth blanketed him in soft and gentle flashes. He needed to move.
They had stopped in a room with a bunch of others, and Jeremiah started to pace, eager to keep moving. He knew better though, he knew what was going on. While he paced he took out his small touch screen device used by high ranking engineers to link and connect with various computer systems, As he paced he made sure to stop by each visible console or wiring and scan it with his engineers key, the device. He nodded slowly, trying not to let the burst of energy get to him.
----------------------------
The walk to Jeremiah’s room was quick and mostly silent. A few times during the spanse the walk nearly turned into a jog, but Jeremiah managed to reign his explosive energy back in and into other means of movement, such as wild gestures to passerby and quick, nearly alien salutations to those who made eye contact through his mask.
His room was rather usual. The walls were unpainted grey metal, and the floors of equal make. There was a fluffy looking bed and numerous consoles for him to tinker with as well as a sliding door that assumingly lead to a small corner of a closet for his things.
The door slide closed behind him with a
whoosh and the silent, smiling man stood there alone, duffel bag in hand. He tossed the bag gently onto the mattress, the sound of a few things clinking together cutting the stale silence of the room.
He lifted a wrist and played with a few buttons on his suit, and with a soft whir the engineer mask folded down into the chest of the suit and he took in a long deep breath. His cheeks were now clean shaven, and his curly hair was trimmed.
A white smile rode on his lips beneath clear green eyes with massive dilated pupils. He shivered as a shot of enjoyment randomly crawled down his spine and within a few moments and a couple more button presses he was out of the heavy suit all together and sitting on his bed in an engineer's blue jumpsuit, rifling through his bag.
His muscles flexed under the expanding fibers of the suit that pressed tightly against his biceps, engorged by the drug. His fingers were nimble and quick as it sorted through his things, folding clothes and placing them in the closet. He the gun he took from Jose under the stack of pants and assorted all his tools and equipment on the shelves of the small space before getting to the last item: the joy.
He juggled the bag in one hand as he looked around the room, placing himself back on the bed. He was still good, his high was going to fade in an hour or so, but he was still safe from withdrawals for at least three or four more hours. Jeremiah knew not to double up, and so he decided it was best to count and hide the precious pills.
With an unending intoxicated smile he pondered the best hiding places, standing up and searching everywhere in his room. It took him a while as he checked and double checked each area he thought of. He even put himself in the shoes of a detective tasked with finding his drugs just to make sure they were in the best possible spot, and after nearly an hour of thinking, with the powerful ecstasy of the drug beginning to fade, he opted to hide it in the shell of one of the computers that were lined on the single bar like desk of his room.
After safely hiding the drugs and taking note of the amount, he figured in his head that with twenty six pills he could survive for about eight days without having to find a new supplier, although he wasn’t quite willing to hold off until time was running out to do so. His smile started to tame into the common expression of a thinking man, and what moist sweat that had silked his skin due to the intoxication dried up, and left him in the odd stage in between the extreme high and the withdrawal.
It was in this rare spare moment he would think about quitting, maybe even confessing to his addiction, but he simply waved it off as crazy talk, he knew the danger of Joy, but he knew how much more dangerous it was to quit. Besides, he liked Joy, it made him feel good, it made him feel invincible, and what man doesn’t want to feel that?
Behind his closed doors he managed to hear the muffled moan of a person in distress. He figured he had time to kill before fixing his high, so he grabbed a small bag of tools and his engineer’s key and walked out of his room.
He quickly spotted the problem. A woman a little older than him was elbow deep into the wall, a cold white panel of metal cast aside as she fooled around with loose wires and a large circuit.
“Problems?” Jeremiah said as he dropped his bag to the floor beside her, slowly slipping on working gloves. The light haired woman turned to him with a frustrated look about her face, she was pretty, but something about her face told Jeremiah that there was more to the story than that. He knew that look from somewhere.
The woman yanked her hands from the hole in the wall, a gold band glistening off her left hand. Jeremiah nodded to himself, as if patting himself on the back for his clever instinct. She huffed a hot sigh and nodded, forcing her lips into a red line, “my door won’t open, it just fizzes, and I tried to… ugh.. I don’t know… my shift is over and I just.”
Jeremiah put his palms up, giving the woman a confident look, “no further explanation needed, how about I take a whack at it?”
The woman shrugged and gestured to the panel, “all yours.”
Jeremiah squinted as he reached into the hole while the woman watched with folded arms. He immediately saw the problem, and noticed her tinkering caused more harm than good, but he kept it to himself as he started to strip a wire for splicing. The silence was a little awkward and so he looked over to her, confident in his ability to work without looking. He gave her a friendly smile as his green eyes flickered back to the panel for a moment, “I’m Jeremiah by the way, engineer.”
“Hannah, basic,” the woman said almost in a dull fashion. Jeremiah laughed and started to strip another wire, “don’t sound too excited.”
“I’m sorry, it’s just, I mean it’s called basic, how exciting can that really be,” Hannah gave a cynical grin that hid some frustration. Jeremiah shrugged as he continued, “make it as exciting as you want. The way I see it is basics and engineers are replaceable, Hannah's and Jeremiah’s on the other hand… well the world can only take so much, am I right?”
Hannah gave a tiny laugh and unfolded her arms, “I suppose you are right.”
Jeremiah nodded while biting his lip, working carefully not to zap himself with the live wire he was handling. After a flash of electricity there was a small whir in the walls. He smiled at his work and started to pack the wire’s back to avoid future complications. He looked back at Hannah, the frustration had left her brown eyes and a look of contentment seemed to wash over her at the sound of the whirr. Jeremiah smiled, “I’m sure your husband would agree. There is only one of you, so why not make the best niche for that one of you possible, no matter what your given title is. I say make your own.”
Hannah smiled, “my husband would agree, he is an ambitious man. Are you married?”
Jeremiah gave a nervous chuckle, “no… no I’m not.” He slammed the panel shut and started to replace the loose plate of white metal back on the wall. He wiped his gloves and turned to Hannah, “all fixed.”
Hannah pressed on her door and it whizzed open. She looked at Jeremiah and gave him an approving nod, “hero of the day.”
-----------
“Go fish? Are you sure? I swear you said something about a queen earlier”, Jeremiah teased as he drew a playing card from the deck that sat center in the middle of Hannah’s table. She was lucky enough to have a family housing room, and her husband, Phil and little girl Kendra were joining the “hero of the day” and Hannah in a playful game of Go Fish.
Kendra giggled as she jutted a finger into Jeremiah’s side, “do you have any quuuuueeeens?”
Jeremiah jumped, his voice light and playful “aha! So you do have queens!”
Kendra screwed her face up, “nu uh! I just got it.” She whined. Jeremiah cocked his head, “are you sure you just got it?”
“Kendra baby, are you trying to fool Mr. Strong?” Hannah asked with maternal precedence. Kendra folded her arms, “but he was winning!”
“No I wasn’t,” Jeremiah said slyly, and Kendra looked up at her with wide hopeful eyes. Jeremiah laughed, “sure I may have been ahead in the game of Go Fish, but I’d say you are beating me in the game of…”
He flicked his wrist and pulls the queen of hearts from behind her ear, “queen of the table.” Kendra beamed at the idea of being the royalty of the table, “you mean princess!”
“But of course! I apologize profusely your majesty!” Jeremiah bowed his head. Phil, a balding man of reasonable build laughed deeply, “please Mr. Strong, don’t encourage her.”
Jeremiah straightened his back and smiled at Phil, his eyes wide and happy, “I’m sorry sir, she seemed to have just gotten the best of me.” He ruffled Kendra’s hair, forcing a playful scowl from the small girl.
Hannah laughed, nearly snorting, “you are a character Jeremiah Strong. Do you have any children?”
Jeremiah stuttered at the question, “no, no I don’t.”
Phil squinted, “Jeremiah, are you alright, you have rings around your eyes.”
A stone fell in Jeremiah’s stomach and he squirmed uneasily, “l-long day I suppose, I should go get some rest.” He stood up out of his chair a little faster than he should have, and his head was hit with a sudden dizziness.
“So suddenly?” Hannah asked, a sense of disappointment in her voice. Kendra pouted and tugged on Jeremiah’s pants, “you can’t go, we aren’t done playing yet.”
Jeremiah frowned and his voice sounded sad, “I’m sorry, next time.” Kendra’s pout got bigger and Jeremiah felt the stone in his stomach fester. He started to make his way to the door. Phil perked a brow at the sluggish way he was moving, “Do you need any coffee or anything?”
“N-no,” Jeremiah stuttered as a wash of cold enveloped him, causing his voice to shiver, “just rest, big day tomorrow you know. Take it easy guys!”
Before anyone could respond he slipped out the door and quickly jogged into his own room. His heart was pounding but his mind felt asleep and cold. He dove quickly for the computer shell.
“Fuck fuck fuck fuck,” he chanted to himself as he tried to peel the panel off with his fingertips, turning white from strain. After a heaven sent
pop Jeremiah wrestled the bag of pills from the shell and ripped it open. He shoved a shaking hand into the pile and procured a small blue pill and popped it in his mouth, sighing a sigh of relief immediately after.
He felt it hit his stomach and almost instantly he fell to the ground, gasping for air. His throat felt swollen and before long his mouth was bone dry as he gasped. The gasped turned into violent dry heaves and he slammed his fist onto the floor with a crack, trying to swallow the pain of the violent outburst. His eyes rolled in the back of his head and he collapsed like a rag doll, shaking aggressively and convulsing.
Then the attack stopped, and all he felt was a warm wash flow over his body like a tropical ocean. His mind laughed and his heart jumped back into action. His muscles burned and flexed, and a large white smile came over his face.
---
WHACK Jeremiah’s hand slapped his metal door and it opened with a
whoosh. He closed his eyes and took a step forward, waiting for his feet to give way, so he could float down to his heavenly pillows. Before he could even get his second foot through the door however, a tiny voice squeaked from the hall.
“Mr. Strong?” Kendra asked behind the man. Jeremiah arched his neck and looked over at the little girl, dressed in a child's pink nightgown of thick cotton, and stitched with cartoon characters.
With one eye open, Jeremiah looked over at her and leaned against the door frame, he yawned, “little early for bed don’t you think, princess?”
Kendra seemed to shuffle in her space and whined, “mommy made me, she always does when Daddy is drinking.”
Jeremiah’s other eye opened, a faint dark ring of fatigue carved below it. He stood up straight, “is everything okay?”
He knelt down and Kendra all but flopped on his knees. She looked up at him, and taking in his serious expression, she jutted out her bottom lip, wobbling it. She looked just as confused as the Engineer, choosing to bury her face into his lap rather than answer.
The man threaded a finger through her brown hair, and furrowed his brow. Any questions about getting involved were quickly crumpled and dismissed in the back of his mind. A single memory seemed to scream at him, and on an impulse, his heart jumped. He patted her head and lifted her chin up, “is everything okay?”
“Mommy…” Kendra whimpered, “mommy cries.”
Jeremiah lifted Kendra onto his hip and walked into his room, placing her down on a spare chair. He pointed a finger at her, “stay right here, okay?”
He looked over to his closet door, and swore he saw his gun glisten underneath a folded shirt. he shook his head and urgently walked out of his room. He practically leapt in front of Hannah’s door and tapped it open.
The door slide with a whoosh and he squinted to see in the dim light, his head kicking him from the start of his withdrawals. There was a gulp and he looked over to where they played cards. A dark figure sat on the chair alone, swallowing tears and choking on sobs.
“Hannah?” Jeremiah asked, taking a few steps forward. He quickly looked away once his eyes adjusted. Her shirt was torn, and she was exposed. A dark angry pit plopped into Jeremiah’s acidic stomach and he spoke again, “Hannah…”
“Jeremiah p-please go.” Hannah gurgled.
“And who the fuck is bothering me now!” A baritone roar boomed from the other room, forcing Hannah to wince and shrink into her chair. She brought her knees up to her chest. Jeremiah took a few steps forward. A sudden
clunk! caused the man to reel back as glass shattered across his forehead.
He blinked his blurry eyes and realized a bottle had been thrown at him. His eyes shone bloodshot, and a rage swelled as a stumbling figure backgrounded by a dim light came into view, arms waving angrily,
Without much thought, Jeremiah burst by the table, flipping a chair on the way. He wasn’t sure if he was helping at this point, but a thick cloud of anger and addiction choked his reason. He ducked under a thrown fist and slammed his forehead down across Phil’s face.
Blood popped from both men, but only Jeremiah remained standing. The engineer pulled back and thrusted a foot forward, cleaving a heavy boot into the man’s rib with a faint crack. Phil turned over and started coughing hoarsely.
Jeremiah shook his head and turned to leave. He suddenly turned back and kicked the man once more but in the back, equally as hard. The man yelped and coughed roughly and Jeremiah kicked him again.
The Engineer turned to Hannah and saw that her tear stained face was wide in surprise, and hate. Jeremiah knew she was looking at him more as a monster than a hero, he knew this, and he felt terrible for it, but with all his will, he didn’t regret beating Phil down.
“Do-” Jeremiah started abruptly, “do you want me to walk you and Kendra down to the infirmary for the night?”
Hannah nodded silently shaking in her seat.
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