Night Life in The City

I’m sitting at a red light on the corner of First and Tenth Avenue.

I know I’m not the only one idling alone at an intersection this late at night, but still, it’s been at least thirty seconds and the light refuses to turn green.

The evening’s already lining up to be trouble. I punch the address from the scrap of paper into my GPS, then frown. The fastest and safest route to my destination takes me through Downtown, which I usually do my best to avoid. I try to calculate different routes and fail.

"I'm heading to Downtown now." I say into my headset, and only receive a simple click in reply.

Green light splashes across the hood of my beat up car, and I hit the accelerator. I keep one impatient hand on the wheel as I flip through the radio. Some heavy metal band begins to scream into the silence, and I try a few other stations before I turn it back off. The evening DJ's are a little too hard core for my taste.

I race down the street, automatically checking out the powder blue warehouse that dominates the left hand corner of Fifth Avenue. There's no company name displayed on the building, but there are always cars parked in the poorly lit parking lot out front. Above the front door sags a vinyl tarp that claims: “Now Hiring!”, but everybody knows it’s a trap.

I've never been in there myself, but I've heard enough stories to stay away.

As I pass a quick succession of numbered streets, I note the sheer volume of warehouses in the district. Identical white buildings stretch as far as the eye can see in every direction, each one covered in graffiti and broken windows boarded up with plywood. Most have been empty since they were built. I have no idea what they're supposed to be used for, but new ones seem to appear almost every night, and the windows are usually broken before the day is out.

The light ahead of me clicks over to a sullen yellow. A man is leaning against a cinder block fence under the light on the corner closest to my car. His black hood is pulled low over his face, shadowing his features.

I narrow my eyes.

The City is filled with a rougher crowd at night so I've learned to keep my head up and my gun close. The guy doesn’t seem interested in doing anything except loitering, but I can tell he's watching me. I make a show of pulling the AK-47 from the backseat and checking the rounds in the magazine before leaving the man behind in a cloud of dust.

Soon I've left the cemetery of warehouses behind for the downtown strip.

There's a reason I try to avoid Downtown, if at all possible. Instead of a dark two lane street, it’s an electric six lane highway, and packed even though it’s well past midnight. There aren't many pedestrians out, mostly because it's a suicide wish to walk the sidewalk at night. The strip is filled with people swerving in and out of traffic, waving their guns in the air and, if they're idiots, firing rounds at passing buildings.

Even without the threat of being shot, there's always the time delays to consider. Tricked out Hondas enjoy holding up traffic by doing donuts in the middle of busy intersections. Most of them manage to escape before someone alerts the cops, but the dumb ones get caught. Though that doesn't mean much since the cops are typically open to bribery. It all depends on how much charisma you’ve got.

Thankfully, nobody is interested in doing any donuts tonight, so I head to the far left lane without much excitement. I mean, there’s the usual drivers who pull up behind me and try to nudge me into oncoming traffic, but they back off after I raise my AK out the window. My car might not be very impressive, but my firepower is.

I check the GPS for my next turn. The signal is green, but I'm forced to slam on the breaks as a man jogs into the crosswalk. He doesn’t seem in the least bit fazed when I come to a screeching halt inches from his body. I start shouting insults as he continues past my car, but I quiet down when I realize who it is. My logic tells me that this isn’t the same guy I saw leaning against the cinder block wall. There’s a lot of pedestrians that look like him around The City, but I can’t shake a feeling of unease as I turn off the strip and head into Prefab town.

I check my rear view mirror, and discover that he's already gone.

I'm usually checking out every “For Sale!” sign that I pass, but that hooded man has me on edge. I’ve never been able to afford a house so close to the main hub of downtown anyway, so it makes no difference. I'm an outskirts dweller. It's all I can afford. It’s my friend Jimmy who lives nearby, and he's the only reason I'm risking going through The City tonight.

"You reached the rendezvous yet?" Jimmy asks.

"Almost there. Hey, where's your friend at? Wasn't he supposed to meet us there?"

"Yeah, but I can't get a hold of him. He says he got caught up at work, which I know is a load of bull."

"Then let's not do this," I say, slowing to a stop on the side of the road. "We don't even know if this is a good lead or not."

"It's a solid lead, I swear. I know this guy Lisa. He knows what he's talking about."

The eagerness in his voice tells me that I won't be able to talk him out of this one.

I sigh as I put the car back into drive. "Alright, but when this operation goes south, you have to accept the consequences and buy me a large pepperoni pizza."

"It won't go south."

"Get your credit card ready anyway."

The neighborhood gets darker and more rundown the further I travel into suburbia. When I pull up to the right address, my AK's in my hands as soon as I hit the curb. I’m casing the place even before I reach the driveway, slipping on infrared goggles, looking for signs of surveillance equipment or booby traps. The entire place is a blank.

The front door is locked, probably chained from the inside. I mutter to myself as I jump the fence to the backyard and try the back door. It's unlocked, and I raise my gun as I crouch into a defensive position. With a deep breath I enter the dark house.

It takes less than five minutes to clear the rooms and prove that I've just made an unnecessary trip.

"Sorry Jimmy, but not only do you owe me a pizza, but you owe me gas money too."

"What do you mean? What did you find?"

"Nothing. I told you this was a dead end."

"Damn! I really thought this was going to be something."

"Do you have the number for Papa Johns, or should I text it to you?"

"No need to rub it in."

I go to the front door and make quick work of the padlock, but I'm still slipping my lock-pick kit into my coat when the door is thrown open and I'm knocked to the ground.

"What the-?!"

I raise my gun, but before I get in a shot, the man in a black hoodie pins me to the ground. A knife appears at my throat, and there's nothing I can do as he starts rifling through my clothes.

"Where is it?" He asks in a surprisingly high pitched voice.

He's clearly not a man.

"Where's what?"

"The map!"

"What map?"

The boy's voice cracks. "The map that effer promised me! The one that leads to the Big Rollers!"

"I don't know what you're talking about, you little cockroach."

He screams, and before I can defend myself he stabs me twice in the stomach.

My vision goes red, and “GAME OVER” flashes across the screen in glaring white letters.

I hear a shout from the next room as I rip off my headset, “Lisa? Lisa what happened?”

“It was a setup. That little cretin knows we have the map. Said someone promised we'd deliver it to him."

Seconds later, Jimmy bursts into my room. His robe is flapping open as he jogs over in his socks to clench the top of the sofa. He curses. "Ah man, it’s that kid!"

"What, you actually know him?"

"Yeah, he’s a part of this syndicate called 'The Grim Reapers'. They dress as the non-playable characters and kill people, which is pretty lame. But this guy knew we had the map so he’s probably playing a different game. I’m almost at the rendezvous so there’s a chance the little punk is still around. I can still avenge you!”

As he dashes back to his room I yell after him, “I hope you ordered that pizza because I'm starving!"

"Give me five minutes!"

I stand up to stretch, sip some lukewarm soda, and fish the last of the cheese puffs from the bag before I settle back down onto the sofa and hit respawn.

Seconds later I’m sitting at a red light, ready to head back into The City.