2022-03-21 - Copenhagen at Seven-Eleven

On a lot approximately three thousand feet big situated on a on a street corner, the convenience store chain sports a low interest dedicated to gas. Being mostly two structures, the one fore to the street has two pumps that can be accessed on either side, a garbage station at one end and window washing station at the other. The whole of it covered with a ceiling that covers just enough to partially protect customers filling their tanks. Between the gas pumps, two foot-wide steel beams support the whole of the roof which had been painted in the franchise's usual color choice but sea air and sun bleaching has caused chips the size of a palm to be missing here and there showing the bare, zinced metal beneath. As it is night, light comes down from the ceiling from four of the six lights. Three-and-a-half, as one seems to be on a permanent flickering mode, headache inducing if one spends too long, longer than a fuel-up, under the weathered shelter.

The main building is brown brick, one story building with a flat ceiling except for a peaked center. A satellite dish takes a non-conspicuous position next to the central sign that, much like the one over the gas pumps, shows signs of better days. Full-length windows before the parking spaces in front of the building for those eager to get a Big Gulp 'n Go are mostly covered by advertisements with pictures meant to rise spirits before those items are purchased and found to be woefully underwhelming. These advertisements halt shy of the doors to allow people to see in and out even though inside the store many items from 12 pack soda cases to firewood have been stacked up along the windows to prevent view in below the hips. As it is dark, two cones of light shine from three light fixtures lighting the gum and other mystery stains on the pavement that also serves as a stop for cars.

Inside, it appears like any other convenience store. Having been divided in thirds. One-third is taken by the self-serve cold drinks, both fountain and slushee variety. The booth that serves as two lane cash registers, to help two customers at a time, along with mostly empty, greasy, slowly rotating racks where the products promised outside would have been, along with their condiments and napkins, along with a small section called Deli which sports healthy alternatives that are, somehow both not as healthy as they should be, and also have expiration dates without the year. Or maybe that's the month and the year? In this section also has the gambling options to check and fill in your MegaPick(tm) ticket. Over the counter are the cigarettes, the back of which advertises exotic brands like Cleopatra and Ernte 23 but also inform the casual viewer that tobacco products won't be sold to those born before today's date, 1981.
Six long rows with a corridor cutting perpendicular to them takes up the last two-thirds of the store. Everything not offered on the shelves are offered on the coolers lining the walls. In both cases, it's every manner of product but none you've ever heard of or have used. Like most of these stores, there is an alcohol section in the coolers, and mirrors positioned in the corners of the store to make sure one store clerk can keep an eye on nearly everything going on.

Parked in front of the store are two vehicles with a parking stall separating them. One is a light-blue 1972 Ford Gran Torino 3-Door Pillared Hardtop while the other is a faded red 2010 Honda Civic.
While the Civic is empty, inside the Torino are two men. The Caucasian driver, resting an arm over the steering wheel while the other occasionally takes a sip from his slurpee, wears a stone-washed jean jacket. Matted light brown five o'clock shadow grows on his jaw in patches all the way up to his frosted tip, short-cropped hair. Between sips, he looks around, either into the store or into the driver side rear-view mirror to look at traffic or pedestrians behind the old vehicle. In the passenger side, a man of Latino decent sits much in the same way though more of his time is spent looking into the store. Instead of a drink, he rests an empty hand on the side-door since both windows have been rolled down. They both wear scowls.

Inside, with his attention briefly glancing towards the door each time there's a chime to announce a new arrival, a dark-haired Caucasian man wearing a smock denoting him as 'John' returns his attention upwards after a polite nod to the new arrival, casting his gaze towards the mirrors that line the store.

Another head, out in the back by the alcoholic section, moves and shifts. Without turning around the few details about this individual that are discernable is that they are African-American with short hair.

Outside the ramshackle store it's Mikaere that passes in front of the Gran Torino and with that the two men inside turn their gazes, one then the other, to watch the large, distracted man pass their windshield. Together, their gazes turned to look at each other and they share an unspoken moment.
No, not like that, but two guys realizing they've came to the same conclusion at the same time after following the foreign sailor with their hungry eyes. Like that. They exit their vehicle, the doors of the old vehicle creaking in protest, with nearly practiced unison, and slam their respective doors closed with two separate, distinct sounds.

When, in short order, Ravn and Ava arrive, the Hispanic man leans back on his door and folds his arms over his chest, tucking his hands into his armpits while watching first Ravn enter. The other man, the driver, comes around to the passenger side with his Slurpee straw in his mouth, taking a long draw, and stops facing his companion, his back to the door. Now that they're out of their vehicle, it could be noted now (or later) that the driver has the full Canadian tuxedo. Jeans to match his jacket, a black t-shirt with an inch wide yellow band around nipple height expands horizontally. The passenger wears cowboy boots, dark jeans, and a tan loose, short-sleeve polo shirt.
Both men wait until after Ava makes her destination clear and passes them. Before the door closes, the driver jerks his head towards the store, still with the straw to his dark frozen treat between his lips, and then shrugs. His companion lifts from the car, his reply is missed but he gets to the door first and holds it open for the driver.

While each person entering was given a nod of acknowledgment by the clerk, these two aren't. When the door double-chimes their arrival, 'John' scowls to the loiterer's now flat expressions. "No," 'John' wags a finger at them which they both ignore, instead, splitting off in separate directions. "You can't come back in here."
While the Hispanic says nothing, he spies the African-American in the back, and heads down the aisles in that direction, reaching out his left hand to graze over laundry detergent products and car oil, knocking into disarray and likely just some of the reason the clerk doesn't want these guys here.
However, it's the driver that responds after a glance to the depths of the store, Ravn's not the only one that can count. He walks to the Slurpee machine, taking the lid off his cup while he walks, "Hey, relax man. We'll be gone in a sec," saying with a smirk as he adds more Coke to his cup.
"You'll have to pay for that!" 'John' asserts.
But the driver's not convinced, shaking his head, "I didn't even leave the premises, my man." After this comment is added, he stops filling up and leaves the station, looking down to put the lid back on the cup not watching Ravn reaching for the mostly red can of Exeter corned beef, a product of Argentina. 'John' glowers but adds nothing more. Both driver and passenger pick aisles that don't contain the New Zealander speaking to himself.

At the coolers, Ava can see more of the man in the same section with her and the look of consternation on his face with large beads of sweat on his brow even though he's wearing loose black long shorts with red and white pinstripes and a loose navy and grey sports jersey of the Washington Seahawks, sporting number seventy-four of Cedric Ogbuehi. The man is looking to the beer through the glass, but not at it and both fists are clenched.

It's doubtful that Mikeaksjks's other language is Japanese, but as he glances over the offerings of ramen the convenience store has, something becomes apparent. Aside from the orange and white striped cookie-esque bag that claims it sports Chikin Ramen along with more popular Maruchan flavors Tomato and Oriental, along with Smack brand Pork.

With his counting completed and all the people, or the majority of them anyway, accounted for and present, Ravn's attention is diverted to snacks for him after getting a treat for his plus one. And in the section that sports the Oreos and the store's multitude of flavors, Dunkers, Red Velvet, Swedish fish, and Lemon cream.

Ava's attempt to offer a subtle warning isn't intercepted by either of the four other men in the store. At the alcohol section, the young, sweating man nervously licks his lips before swaying, shifting his weight from foot to foot proving, at least, that he isn't immobile. Just in time for the Passenger to arrive behind him, and likely dashing the likelihood that he'll turn from looking at beer to crawling along the top of the aisles for Ravn. The Hispanic passenger stops within the other man's personal space, turning his torso to make it easier for him to look into the depths of the store, passing the customers once over on his way to look for the Driver. All the while his lips are moving, his voice low, a whisper to the other man.
All Ava's able to make out is, "...ntro, sangre fuera, eh?" as his voice rises with the question and the last thing spoken before the Driver finishes making his way to the two of them in the cooler with a loud, rude pull from his Slurpee. Then, with an empty hand, slaps the African-American in the shoulder and cranes his head to get a better look at the younger man's face with an inquisitive look on his own. Unlike his companion, he's loud and rude, and likely man-spreads when he rides the bus. "Well? What's it going to be?" he asks while still under the angry gaze of 'John' since all the other customers are behaving.

Then change has been subtle, at first, and difficult to notice until now. While normally a store such as this would have a well-lit interior, the lighting in this gently eroded store's lights candle power has been lesser than since entry.
It's only now, after addressing Ravn that Ava is noticing too, that the illumination level has been growing lower. At first, to slowly, to subtly for the human eye to notice. But as they've been spending more time the slow drain on not just the glow of the incandescent lights, but the machines which have been set to emit eye-catching light, are being drained at a quicker rate. Enough so that it's finally noticeable.

In addition, Ravn notices two things:
The first of which is that there are no lights outside. While that in itself is not unusual, it is dark, night, outside. In a city, light pollution is everywhere from passing cars, nearby shops, and stores, street lights, or even lighting up gas pumps on the attached gas station just outside the windows. The windows now only showcase inky, black darkness.
Secondly, just how the lights in the store that Ava has noticed are growing dimmer, but also how they are. Not unlike fingers, pulling light into an open maw, darker lines along ceiling, wall, floor, and shelving. Writhing, moving, pulling like hungry conduits. To him, their destination all lead to one place -- a particular non-glimmering dark-skinned man in a sports jersey with two men on either side of him. A man Ravn's currently, subtly, being pointed to.

From Ava's discerning eye, or Ravn's, the seven people in the convenience store are 'just' people. Three of them happen to glimmer, but all of those people have met, or are on the phone with their mother. Dear, sweet, intrusive mother.
If the clerk, 'John', behind the cash register is nearest to the door, then Mikaere, browsing the limited selection of cereals down aisle 2a. After Ava approached Ravn, they occupy 4b by themselves and cookies, while at the back of the store, at the end of aisle 3b are the remaining people, clustered around the unresponsive sweaty man.

While the shadows pull, leeching the light from all viable sources, it is only those with glimmer (and, for now, aren't distracted with discontinued ramen) that see the darkness thickening. The writhing lines pulling to the sweating man at the beer section who has yet to answer his friends, those lines thickening too until they look like fingers, four abnormally long, willowy digits with their hooks crawling, coalescing from the pool around the cash register area, through the aisles and wall and ceiling, up the back of his thighs and under his long shorts.

It isn't the lights outside that has Ravn's, or any other Poughkeepsieian, attention. It's the lights inside. Outside is a void of black. The lights inside that are fainting now at a noticeable rate to everyone. Enough so that 'John', and the Driver and Passenger glance up. While the hoodlums quickly dismiss the lights as falling squarely into the 'not my problem' category and return their attention down to the person at the alcohol section of the coolers, the Driver even giving the catatonic man a nudge with the elbow of the arm he holds his Slurpee with. He follows it with an up nod of his chin, "Well? Hello. You there?"
The Passenger adds his own, "It's an easy answer, ese"
'John' glances up at the lights as well and while the customers aren't being disruptive at the moment, the sole worker mumbles under his breath about faulty wiring and stares searching under the counter he stands behind. To his side, he takes a few steps and with a broom gives the ceiling recessed light over his head a couple of jabs with the wooden long broom handle.

Their attention on their companion isn't held for long, not when Ravn speaks up and then advertises the only woman in the store's state. The Driver gives the Passenger an absentminded smack with the back of his hand on the shoulder, "I bet we could make her less lonely, right?" His friend sneers in reply while giving Ava a predatory glare.

Behind them, the Driver and Passenger, the man starts to move, slowly taking his time to turn around while his friends are distracted and take steps forward placing them closer to aisle 4b and leering lecherously at Ava so they don't notice when the African-American turns around.
Instead of saying goodnight to her son, Mikaere only hears his own words repeated to him with a rising in both volume and shrill, shaken quality to the words that they're unrecognizable as first emanating from his own mouth:

You want me to eat, DON'T YOU

The whites, or sclera of the Cooler Man's eyes, as they open wide, get injected with a swirling black ink that swiftly overwhelms the white until only black pits remain just as he lifts his head almost in concert with the lights. Dying.
Inside. Outside. Cell phone. Along with the light stopping, so too does sound for a swift second. The sound of the incandescent lights, the coolers drawing heat, the Slurpee machine chilling flavored sugar-water, the gambling machines, the empty rollers meant to heat food. It's all, swiftly, deafly quiet.

Somewhere, over the pond maybe, a sailor's mother has been tapping her landline base while calling out inquisitively for her son. Worried, she last heard from him abruptly telling her he was fine. A few repairs and, and. And what? The line, and hopefully not her child, went dead. She's seen the news. She knows what goes on there, in that former colony. Everyone is armed and shooting at each other. Oh lord, he's bleeding in a ditch somewhere. Maybe she'll try Laura and let her know what's going on. Laura's young, she can still save my dying son, ooooh!

Which begs the question, who or as Ravn supposed, what has Mikaere been speaking to this whole time? A question Mikaere's left to ponder while Ravn glances around for exits before the lights die. Other than the obvious two doors they came through, there's a unisex bathroom with a handwritten obscured note: For customers only. On top of that is the obligatory sign Out of Order. Next to it, an alcove that leads to the back, and if one has spent any time in the bowels of a convenience store, usually leads to a fire escape door. In this case, it leads to a chest-high stack of Gatorade.

Unfortunately, when the lights die making it impossible to even see a hand in front of your own face, it makes it likewise unable to determine which flavours, much less colours of Gatorade they are causing a fire inspection infraction.
Ava's not sorry about breaking a poor, small-time hoodlum's heart, but frosted tips takes it well, even with the African-American paused behind them. With a shrug and pursed lips, he chimes, "Your loss, toots," before sucking on his comfort drink.
Then the pitch darkness.

"Ah shit," someone says.
"That wasn't me," another person says.
"Turn on all the lights," says another, while trying to remember where he last saw the flashlights and batteries. It was nearby, that much he can recall, the colourful battery packaging still leaving a scar in his memory from passing them on his way to get that solitary can of corned beef, a product of Argentina. Torches, or as real people call them, flashlights are a different story.
"I'm trying!", says the second voice.

As Ava lifts her hand to create the fire bloom, she and she alone can feel it being leached from her. Not so much the fire's heat, the fire's size, or any other aspect of it. Only just one. Instead of finally creating some light, any light in the room, the fire blossom creates a small amount of lux, disappointingly so, enough that Ravn and Ava, together for now even while Ava retreats from Ravn, are illuminated and can make out the products on the shelves right next to the light as though Ava were holding a candle.
But Mikaere, 'John', the two hoodlums, they aren't so fortunate.

"What'd you not pay the electricity bi--" begins the voice recognizable as the Driver. Then a second of silence before there's a sound like a rotted peach being squeezed violently; juices, solids dripping and dropping to the ground. "Eh?!" someone in that direction says, surprised and frightened, followed by the metallic sound of a gun's hammer being cocked back.
It would be likely that only Ava recognizes the next sound. Without the distracting sound of a whirling saw, it's the unmistakable sound of a ribcage opened. Suddenly. Violently. Multiple cracks of wet bone.
It's stone-cold quiet again, for a beat of the heart.
Until something chatters, like teeth tap-tap-tapping together in the dark.
A wet drip.

Suddenly, the Slurpee machine takes a breath of life, whirring once, the lights on the front panel not in sync with one another solid and the other flashing. They spell out Slurp. E-e-e-e-e. Then it too dies. In the space of that machine coming to life and casting its flickering light, Mikaere finds himself greeted by a specter. A puzzled tilting of its head, in the flashing light, and then it is gone.

Something akin to a wet rag splats wetly against the linoleum floor. A wet drip follows.

In the darkness, there's a clambering by the silent coolers followed by another sound of bone breaking, this time multiple small breaks, muted before the shuffling sound resumes and, in the darkness, the hushed sounds, it's heard moving. Shambling around to the first row and towards the doors, towards the cash register.
A Chik-chik-chik-chik-chik of chattering teeth sounds again, this time in front of Ava and Ravn; near the coolers again. Ava focuses, fueling the healthy flame in her palm with more of her Power and feels it flowing freely. For a moment, a short pause it even begins to brighten in the room. And she may have wished she hadn't. With the glass along the coolers, the mirrors the clerk had been using to keep an eye on the man with the black, soulless eyes assist in reflecting the photons around the large space.

At the end of their row, on the floor, lays a dark red pile. From which ruby liquid moves, as liquid does, towards the floor's lowest point. Slowly, the crimson blood claims new land. Behind the pile of red, a denim-clad leg extends, the remainder of the person laying on the floor around the corner of the gondola shelving.
A substance falls, catching the eye, and lands like a wet rag into the blood before flopping to the pile. With Ava's light, the substance is identifiable as a flay of skin, darkly pigmented skin, the pile, she catches a glimpse of a kidney, a liver nesting in a coil of the large intestine which itself is nestled in long shorts.
Higher still, where those men had been standing is a vicious streak of red across the cooler glass, the splatter pattern begins at what appears to be four feet off the ground and widens as it stretches into the next cooler door before it began to streak, succumbing to gravity. The ceiling. The ceiling has been painted red with a chunky, sloppy wet brush.

Then, as before Ava feels her flame being fed upon and its light, even before it grew to full illumination, dims, casting the scene they just witnessed back into the dark with only the blood-streaked glass, the pile of bloody clothes and internal organs, and the...
Wasn't there a leg? And in its place lays a single red palm print.

It is with that realization coming over them, that the light returns to its previous dim candlelight. Certainly, enough for Mikaere to see Ravn and Ava against the only light should he decide to follow Ava's advice. But Mikaere's not the only one.
"WHAT?!?" shout-asks 'John,' clearly freaking out if only a little, responding to Mikaere, "What the fuck what?!" Not even 'John's' going to comment on the New Zealander's yelp, but he is inquiring as to what Glimmering thing caused it.

As though to answer his question, a creature from Poughkeepsie jumps onto the top of the gondola shelving and sprints across it towards the duo, Ava and Ravn. There's a difference between crab and spider-walking. Majoritively, whether the chest is pointed up or down, and how the head is to be held to see where one is going. In this case, The Passenger spider-sprints, knocking dish-soap and SOS pads to clutter on the ground. When he runs to the snack shelf next, Ravn either as a distraction or as a defense attempts to Move. But with the weight of The Passenger along with the items on the shelf, the best be manages is to become a Slider.

When the gondola shelf shifts under The Passenger, the once assuming Hispanic man leaps, with agility a human ought not to possess, to the other side of the shelf, though his movements are heard continuing past them, realizing now for the moment he was spotted, he didn't have his head canted to see. It had twisted a full one hundred and eighty degrees, stretch marks against what was once the nape of his neck red, fresh.
And eyes. Black. Black as a doll's eyes.
"What thing?!" shouts 'John', his voice cracking under the stress, and then, maybe reflexively he adds from the dark, "Whatever that noise is, you're going to pay for it," without a lick of confidence.
From the direction of the coolers, in a different location than before, near the endcaps of the shelf, there's scrambling along the floor.

Taking a knee is a more macho way to say Mikaere crouches, alone, in the near dark and with either ritual preparation, or just attempting to calm himself down opens himself up to the consciousness around him. Within the order of proximity, the first consciousness he touches is without a doubt one of the things they're looking for. Something alien, definitely a puzzle piece and it's while determining that much that Mikaere felts its intelligence turn and. Notice him. Again.

While Mikaere had been down aisle 2a, from him this creature is in the second portion of the first aisle, closest to the coolers that hum no more, the same row with the questionable deli selection, and when he, Mikaere, will leave, that sapient thing will move down the aisle at a slow, steady pace stalking its destination.
The next two thinking, self-aware creatures reside in aisle 4a having just passed the empty corridor that runs horizontally through the six rows. I mean, if you can call a Dane self-aware. They call flashlights torches after all. These two are certainly human (or are they, dang Danes).

Finally, the last sapient person is behind Mikaere, closer to the front doors even behind the counter. But then, at the furthest reaches of his range, Miaere feels something else. No, many something elses. Alien thoughts at the limit of his range that wink in and out when he races down the rows of gondola shelving, small things with small brains. Waiting, hovering along the flat plane of the floor but also above it and below. When he joins Ava and Ravn those small thinkers at the very edge of his reach disappear -- not because they move but because he has and put them outside his distance.

Launching another expletive, 'John' gives a sound in reply that's more of a throaty question that might be missed over the clang of the dropped basket, and the rustling of consumables. Feet stomping around the corner, with his mental map, he knows Ava and Ravn are just two aisles deeper from where he was and heads for the safety of the light, and numbers.

It's crazy how fear can sometimes change the memory of what happened. Feed wasn't the word it used. Bravely, Ravn attempts to negotiate with the darkness past the candle-light fire burning in Ava's palm and he's answered with a clatter from two aisles down. Rushing footsteps, and then a big New Zealander.
It isn't even Christmas. After hashing a plan with his friends or if not friends exactly, non-hostiles, Ravn beseeches the darkness once more, to no effect.

When Ava shouts something in the direction of the only living human that doesn't Glimmer over her shoulder 'John' gives a "Huh? Wha" snapping out of whatever torpor he had sunken into and mutters under his breath, "I'm not even supposed to be here today," before he raises his voice, "I can't-- look, I can't leave customers in here. You have to leave before I lock up. And I don't know why the lights aren't working." Then, under his breath again 'John' adds to himself, "Maybe it’s a fuse problem. Where are they?" Shuffling heard next as 'John' begins to feel for drawers and then feel inside them.

Before giving herself another surge of power, Ava attempts Ravn's tactic of diplomacy. Without an answer, the fire begins to brighten, again and again, feeling a source from elsewhere pulling the light the surge causes away but not before spying the grim pile at the end of their aisle. To be clear, what was seen on the floor wasn't a dead body. Not completely, not even with that quick glance, not to Ava's trained eyes. It was what remained of a body if the skin decided, in strips, to suddenly and violently vacate a person all at once. And organs that are meant to be on the inside fell out of the body in a single, sickening, wet shlurp. Juices, solids, and all.

In the darkness to their right and slightly behind them, in the direction The Passenger jumped to, they hear the sound of teeth clicking together.
Chik-chik-chik-chik.
To their left, they hear the sound of shivering teeth, slowly moving closer or louder.
Chik-chik-chik-chik.

And Mikaere knows that neither of them is the alien intelligence. That gives a glance while moving slowly, with purpose down the far aisle. A glance, the briefest of acknowledgments given to the three shimmering, shiny people while it moves past them, the briefest of sounds, scraping against the linoleum flooring they all, save Ravn, hear. Surrounded, The Passenger and presumably The Driver draws nearer, just a shelving unit away. They were predators in life and now, whatever they may be, as well.

From the two separate directions, the chattering of teeth continues for just a little longer.
Chik-chik-chik-chik-chik
Then, The Passenger, crawls up the wall just behind their position, climbing until he's in plain view. Stuck to the ceiling like the spider he imitates with his creeping, coming to a stop when hands are on the ceiling and shoed feet are still on the wall. Only then does his head slow rolls with the sound of grounding gravel to fixate down at the trio huddled like champions. Mouth opens as the creature hisses, with a harmless but noxious spray of spittle, "Hissss."

While The Passenger starts crawling into position, there's a distraction from the other side. Scrambling on the shelving, products heard falling to the ground in chaotic disarray, then his hand followed by the frosted tips of The Driver and his black, dead eyes. He answers the hissing of his companion, phlegm sticking to his upper and lower lips wobbles with the force of his exhaled breath. "Heeeee," he first hisses to his companion, then his neck sounds like crunching gravel as it too rolls down to focus his attention down, both close enough to strike. Or be stricken.

With Mikaere's direction, Ava's able to stand and look over the shelving units. With the light illuminating from her hand she's able to make out the creature Mikaere's able to sense. With its back to the group and its attention on 'John' even through the darkness, it’s the sudden light that causes it to turn around sharply, suddenly. Like a Chlamydosaurus the specter that Mikaere first spotted with a skull fixates dark, empty eye sockets and slightly agape mouth, at Ava. A skeletal figure for what can be seen over the tops of the gondola shelving still wet with blood and wearing strips of darkly pigmented skin over their white, sun-bleached bones. Then its sternum splits in half, which shouldn't happen. Its rib cage swings apart and then swings over its own shoulders, which shouldn't happen. The ribs extend and stretch like fingers or like the frills on a frilled lizard, quivering and shaking, meant to intimidate the woman into sitting back down.

The reflexive trembling of its bone wings that scrap the ceiling only further causes more swaths of fatty flesh to fall with repeated wet splats to the floor. 'John' stares at this display, wide-eyed, in slack-jawed disbelief at the creature that was stalking him.

Engulfing the wraith with her sickly, noxious fire it tilts its boney head and neck back while its "wings" fall, silently screaming. There's a stumble back, steading itself on the individually wrapped sub sandwiches which go from toasted to charred where its hand lays. 'John' is looked to, and the shade leans forward in a sprint but only makes it to the counter that 'John's' still taking refuge from. Then, weakly, with a rickety shudder, it reaches forward and claws the countertop with green fire licking bone claws as it falls down to knees and down to the ground, being obscured by the shelves.

A sickening turning of the stomach comes at the same time Mikaere feels those many minds rushing in with the collapse of the skeletal beast. The Driver, The Passenger don't seem to notice as they leap from their positions, mouths agape.

Their breath hot.

Steven had considered himself fortunate. He was going to be the first in his family to go to college on a track scholarship. But then his single mother got sick and she didn't have healthcare. Steve had to quit school and get a job, and when all the insurance companies started denying his mother coverage based on her pre-existing condition and expensive treatment bills, he didn't see any way out.
Until they made him an offer.
Sure he wouldn't make a ton, to begin with, but after a while, there'd be more than enough money for him, for his mother. Fancy cars, women, whatever he wanted. Membership has its privileges.

But it also has its costs. 'Blood in, blood out,' they reminded him. And at first, Steven didn't know exactly what they meant until they sat in the Gran Torino with the loaded revolver in his hand. He'd been raised a God-fearing boy, but the choice he was given was impossible. Do nothing, and his mother dies. Kill one man, and his mother gets to live, and he goes to jail if he ever upsets his gang.

What would anyone do for family?

He tucked the gun into his long shorts and went inside, got a suspicious eye from the racist clerk, and went to the back, chewing his deep dilemma over. Who was he to decide who gets to live or die, and yet the snub-nose revolver gave him exactly that choice.

Maybe everything would have been fine had not so much power came walking through the door, beacons to dark, evil forces are already drawn to his moral crisis and made everything just so much worse.

With a start the trio wake from their dream. Maybe at the cot during a nap. Maybe at their desk after working so very late.
A dream, just a dream.

...
Except, Ava still possesses burns on her arm from holding the fire for far too long and feeding it more than she should. Ravn wakes to hold a can of corned beef a product of Argentina. It will prove to maybe be the worst souvenir of the Dream when he opens it. And worse of all, Mikaere wakes to find many, oh so many calls waiting for him, worried and frantic when his phone call was cut off.