The Country from Hell
Outside, it is hot as hell, but you just can't stop grinning. People look at you strangely. Anyone who looks happy in Iad is either drunk or crazy or on drugs, or not from Iad at all. You smile brazenly back. Stopping at the street corner, you have to catch your breath. Your thoughts whirl madly around in your head. Those ironic green eyes seem to follow you as you go, twinkling at you as you limp along. You can't even feel your leg, much less experience pain.
It slowly dawns on you that you need to find a way home. Remembering that you have no money for a taxi fare, you scrounge desperately in your purse for a streetcar ticket. It seems strange to be lugging an expensive American computer with you, yet not have enough even to hire a cab to carry you across your small city. But voilà! Your tattered two-way ticket appears at the bottom of your bag, with one ride left. Triumphantly, you make your way to the station opposite City Hall.
Not paying any heed to the jostling and complaints of all the people around you, you wait in line to place your ticket in the mechanical hole-punch that marks each ride. Such is the state of Iadian high-tech. These streetcars were bought sometime in the 70's on wholesale from East Germany because the Communists there refused to keep anything so shoddy looking. The Communists here bit right at the offer like hungry dogs, anxious for the opportunity to "modernize" the proud old turn-of-the-century trolleys with these industrial beasts, however ugly they might be.
Just as you are placing your ticket in the machine, a hand reaches out and snatches it away. You turn with surprise to the ticket inspector who you didn't realize was standing uncomfortably close to you.
"Show me your ticket please, Miss," he snarls. He is perhaps the ugliest man you have ever seen, one eye covered with a black patch, the other gleaming with alcoholic vengeance. A huge purple scar mars his left cheek. His breath reeks of custia.
"You just took my ticket," you state directly, still coming down off your brazen high.
"I need to see your ticket," he repeats.
"You have got to be joking!" you laugh. You look around at the other people on the streetcar, who have surely seen the practical joke that just transpired. But they all either ignore you or stare at you angrily. And then it dawns on you. They have seen the laptop peeking out from the top of your bag. They have seen the smile on your face. They want you to pay for these crimes.
As quickly and as whimsically as your heart had taken flight, it now sinks back down into the Iadian mire. Try as you might, you can't seem to speak.
"That will cost you six hundred thousand," says the inspector in his same menacing monotone.
"I don't have that much."
"You don't have that much! Did you not notice what's in your bag? That's a nice machine you've got. Yet you expect me to believe you don't have six hundred thousand!"
"I don't it was a gift please. I'll give you my name and address. I'll come to pay it, I promise."
"No, Miss. That's not the way it works here in Iad. If you don't pay, I don't get paid. Now it's nothing personal, dear, but I'll need to relieve you of your computer if you continue denying the tiny little sum this poor old pensioner asks for."
"I told you I don't have it, dammit!"
"Another word out of you and I will be forced to drag you off this streetcar." He grabs your arm tightly. "Then I will have to call the police and tell them that a wealthy young woman is refusing to pay out of pure spite."
His grip tightens even more, cutting off the circulation. Your arm goes numb. Your mind goes numb. This is the price you pay for letting your emotions run away with you. You stand vulnerable for one second, just one second, and someone is sure to exploit it. With your eyes focused dully on the shaking barred windowpanes of the trolley, you let the inspector reach nimbly into your bag, leaving it to hang limp and empty on your shoulder.
Such is life. It's just as well, since you couldn't afford the part to fix it anyway. A computer like that never belonged with a girl like you. You sit down defeated, staring at the floor for fear that someone may give you a sympathetic gaze. That would just kill you.
You become aware that you have reached your stop. You step off the streetcar. You move zombie-like towards your building, open the door, walk up the hall with the flickering bulb, up the stairs and into your apartment.
Your doleful reverie is interrupted by a strange noise coming from the kitchen
It slowly dawns on you that you need to find a way home. Remembering that you have no money for a taxi fare, you scrounge desperately in your purse for a streetcar ticket. It seems strange to be lugging an expensive American computer with you, yet not have enough even to hire a cab to carry you across your small city. But voilà! Your tattered two-way ticket appears at the bottom of your bag, with one ride left. Triumphantly, you make your way to the station opposite City Hall.
Not paying any heed to the jostling and complaints of all the people around you, you wait in line to place your ticket in the mechanical hole-punch that marks each ride. Such is the state of Iadian high-tech. These streetcars were bought sometime in the 70's on wholesale from East Germany because the Communists there refused to keep anything so shoddy looking. The Communists here bit right at the offer like hungry dogs, anxious for the opportunity to "modernize" the proud old turn-of-the-century trolleys with these industrial beasts, however ugly they might be.
Just as you are placing your ticket in the machine, a hand reaches out and snatches it away. You turn with surprise to the ticket inspector who you didn't realize was standing uncomfortably close to you.
"Show me your ticket please, Miss," he snarls. He is perhaps the ugliest man you have ever seen, one eye covered with a black patch, the other gleaming with alcoholic vengeance. A huge purple scar mars his left cheek. His breath reeks of custia.
"You just took my ticket," you state directly, still coming down off your brazen high.
"I need to see your ticket," he repeats.
"You have got to be joking!" you laugh. You look around at the other people on the streetcar, who have surely seen the practical joke that just transpired. But they all either ignore you or stare at you angrily. And then it dawns on you. They have seen the laptop peeking out from the top of your bag. They have seen the smile on your face. They want you to pay for these crimes.
As quickly and as whimsically as your heart had taken flight, it now sinks back down into the Iadian mire. Try as you might, you can't seem to speak.
"That will cost you six hundred thousand," says the inspector in his same menacing monotone.
"I don't have that much."
"You don't have that much! Did you not notice what's in your bag? That's a nice machine you've got. Yet you expect me to believe you don't have six hundred thousand!"
"I don't it was a gift please. I'll give you my name and address. I'll come to pay it, I promise."
"No, Miss. That's not the way it works here in Iad. If you don't pay, I don't get paid. Now it's nothing personal, dear, but I'll need to relieve you of your computer if you continue denying the tiny little sum this poor old pensioner asks for."
"I told you I don't have it, dammit!"
"Another word out of you and I will be forced to drag you off this streetcar." He grabs your arm tightly. "Then I will have to call the police and tell them that a wealthy young woman is refusing to pay out of pure spite."
His grip tightens even more, cutting off the circulation. Your arm goes numb. Your mind goes numb. This is the price you pay for letting your emotions run away with you. You stand vulnerable for one second, just one second, and someone is sure to exploit it. With your eyes focused dully on the shaking barred windowpanes of the trolley, you let the inspector reach nimbly into your bag, leaving it to hang limp and empty on your shoulder.
Such is life. It's just as well, since you couldn't afford the part to fix it anyway. A computer like that never belonged with a girl like you. You sit down defeated, staring at the floor for fear that someone may give you a sympathetic gaze. That would just kill you.
You become aware that you have reached your stop. You step off the streetcar. You move zombie-like towards your building, open the door, walk up the hall with the flickering bulb, up the stairs and into your apartment.
Your doleful reverie is interrupted by a strange noise coming from the kitchen