There are many factors that go into the death of any city, let alone the City. Indeed, truly understanding the death of anything requires a large amount of hindsight. For an event as massive as the death of the last City, that amount may never come. History is as much a story as any other, with its own authors, biases, and implications. But perhaps most importantly are the gaps within them that may never be resolved (be they intentional or otherwise); information that was repressed, lost, or missed out on completely due to the focus of the tale being on other things.
As with any story, there are, of course, threads one can pull when looking at the last days of the City. There are the wanderings and tangents that made up Billy Palmer’s odyssey towards his deadly confrontation with Robert Walpole the Seventh. Alternatively, one can look at the return and implications of the Thin White Duke and, more importantly, those who encountered it. Someone could look at the various productions the Spiders put on throughout those last few days and note the air of collapse in even the most optimistic of stories. One could do the sensible thing and look at the lives of Gabriel Lee, Tony Samson, Johnny Willis, and even the officer who killed them (whose name was lost to time). The preparation for the rave that killed the City and how it tied into the performance of The King in Yellow that killed the City. And then, there’s the mysterious story of Fred Lupis and Jullietta Pastacelli.
But then, there are the stories that were not recorded. The small triumphs and tragedies no one thought to see when trying to understand the goings on of the world they called a City. History tends to ignore the marginal, the margin, and anything that doesn’t fit within its narrative. The truth of the matter is there are many factors that go into the end of something as monumental as the concept of cities. A piece of the world is missing, as the saying goes. Which is to say there will always be something lost due to the sheer magnitude of the events… a Rosetta stone that solves the lingering doubts and implications to everyone’s satisfaction. Alas, such things do not exist in a singular form. It’s up to historians keeping what records they have straight to solve as many of those doubts as they can. Even if that means History can never be… Perhaps there are a multitude of histories, more than one story of the world and more than one storyteller who can tell it. I didn’t expect to live long enough to tell the stories I have told. I should be dead soon. Perhaps I died long ago and have been haunting this story. Perhaps I just lived long enough to tell this story. (I suppose I’ll find out tomorrow…) But perhaps there is room in this history for one final story; one dangling loose thread to pull, before the curtain closes on the City…
Ryan Chack was standing in the ruins of the Bashful Bigot. The agreed upon story was that the bar was struck by lightning a few times until the whole place just burnt to the ground. Those that were inside burned alive; trapped behind metal bars fitted to the glass to keep “foreigners” from coming in. Ryan had been told many times in his life that the Universe is a cruel, uncaring place. But those pessimistic people typically meant, “Good things happen to bad people, so stop trying to change that you fucking snowflake” (or whatever the modern nomenclature for “less than a man” was at the time). Rarely did they mean, “The Universe is an ever shifting, chaotic thing with not a single person at the driving wheel, so have a drink while the direction the car you call life turns towards a cliff without warning.” (Then again, the universe tends to have far more creative methods of keeping people trapped in a building than shoving a metal rod into the door handles…)
Regardless, Ryan found himself standing in the ruins looking at what had become of the City. The storm appeared to have destroyed many of the buildings that had survived collapse and abandonment. Some of the structures might have mostly remained, but their roofs and walls had collapsed in on themselves. The vinery that seemed to be invading the City like a foreign barbarian at the gates of Rome was now a brother to the land. Grass was beginning to grow in the sidewalk as if it was pure dirt. There were even a few flowers budding up out of the cracks.
When the rain cleared that morning, Ryan felt there was something missing. The streets felt different to walk down and the sky swapped its Technicolor Blue for a rainbow of Magentas and Emeralds and Snow. Maybe it was the lives that were lost, both those of the innocent and of the guilty. Maybe he was feeling the phantom pain for a time when rain never came. Or maybe some… essence had finally died within the City. Some central tenant that made the City was what it was, now lost forevermore.
Either way, the city had changed. Those who dwelled outside seemed more willing to enter the territory as if the moat of fire keeping them from coming in had gone to ash. They came with food, plants, and a willingness to listen. Some helped pull citizens of the city from out of the wreckage of demolished apartments while others tended to the lost orphans afraid of the world that had… Ryan wanted to think died, but it didn’t look dead to him. There seemed to be more life than ever before in this place calling itself a city. People were communing with one another with little to no fear. Faces of different shades and ideologies were working or talking or even simply walking together. There were some who were alone, but they didn’t appear to be lonely anymore.
In the distance, Ryan could see someone staring at a crooked tree. He couldn’t quite make out who they were from where he was standing, but there was an air of familiarity to them. Not in the sense that they had met once before, but in the sense that Ryan had met someone like them. Or, at the very least, they had a mutual acquaintance. Ryan had a good eye for that sort of thing. Besides, he was curious why someone would be so fascinated by something as mundane as a tree. …Plus he was starting to get looks from people for standing in the remains of what could charitably be called an exclusive bar. The kind of looks he didn’t much care for.
As Ryan got closer to the person, more details emerged. They had their blue hair cut in a rather odd fashion such that a less culturally knowledgeable person might mistake it for someone trying not to look like they were balding. Given the tan, they had frequented various beaches and other outdoor locations. The paleness left behind by a wedding band had begun to meld with the tan, though it was still noticeable upon examination. They were lean, though they lacked the gauntness that living in the City tended to give people. Rather, they had the leanness of a bygone age when cities weren’t an extinct species. They also had a tattoo on their left arm of a white circle and a button on their right lapel of a three eyed smiley face with a red arrow crudely drawn on it. It probably meant something to them, but Ryan couldn’t put his finger on what exactly.
“Excuse me,” coughed Ryan. The person turned slightly surprised.
“Oh sorry,” they replied with the flummoxed look in their eyes of someone who was caught peeping through a window. “Didn’t see you there. …How long were you there?”
“‘Bout a minute. I just walked over here from the bar that burnt down.” The person gave Ryan a dirty look. “I was hoping to meet a friend there.” The look on their face only hardened. “Look, Spike said that he frequents the bar at 217 Avalon Boulevard, but each time I went there, he never showed.” The look softened. “I’m starting to get worried.”
“That’s,” pointing at the bar, “217 Aviation Boulevard. q is what you’re looking for.”
“You’re kidding! Ha-ha! I’ve been spending the past week going to that awful place in the hopes that he was trolling the bastards. It’s such a relief; you know, I was starting to think he might be a racist prick, which isn’t at all how he framed himself within his-”
“Yeah, sure. I don’t believe you’ve introduced yourself.”
“Oh, uh. Ryan. Ryan Chack. And you are…?”
“Alex.” Ryan looked at them as if they had a last name they were willing to give. Ryan reached out his hand as an offer to shake it, but Alex declined.
Rather than prolong the embarrassing look on his face any longer, Ryan said, “Do you want to come with me to the right bar?”
“Eh, I don’t have anything better to do.” And so, the pair walked to the bar.
“So why were you looking at the tree anyways?”
“It’s the only tree for miles.”
“Yeah, but… it’s a tree.”
“It’s not just any tree! Many a Spider and wizard claim that should the hole be filled, the city would die.”
“Oh?”
“I was looking at the hole.”
“And?”
“There’s a bullet in there. Probably a bit of brain marrow as well.”
“So you think because of this, this place is dead?” A wry smile began to form on Ryan’s face with neither one of them noticing.
“Well, yeah.”
“Couldn’t it be just coincidence?” Alex lowered their eyebrows the way one does when looking at someone yelling you for not warning them about walking into a hornet’s nest that you clearly told them not to go into. They then became embarrassed when they realized they hadn’t told Ryan there was a hornet’s nest to walk into and were once again acting as if they had.
“I’m a wizard, so probably not, no.”
“Oh, shit,” babbled Ryan, “I’m sorry. If I had known you were a wizard, I wouldn’t have- Not that I was right to say it in the first- I mean, it’s not like you dress like a wizard or any- I mean, you don’t even have a pointy hat- You know, I’ve met some wizards in my travels, and they have been the nicest people I have ever- I mean, there’s ah there’s nothing wrong with thinking that- I mean, while I personally don’t see the need for everything to line up, I’m sure it’s perfectly fine for other people to think that-"
“Do please shut up,” said Alex in a curt tone. And so, Ryan shut up for a good couple of minutes. It didn’t feel like an awkward silence so much as the silence one hears when trying to get some sleep in a dark, secluded wood. Eventually, Alex said, “You know, I was actually looking for a… friend of mine as well.”
“Oh really,” said Ryan with genuine interest.
“Yes, we grew up together and I hadn’t seen her in a while. I thought she went missing or, gods forbid, got caught and sent to one of those abysmal factories.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard terrible things about those places. Did you know that-”
“Anyways, I meditated for a good long while as to what to do. Then I got bored and did some anarchistic…” Alex decided not to chance Ryan also being aware of his mystical form.
“Some anarchistic…?” Ryan was rotating his index and middle fingers for a bit.
“…Sigil magic.” Alex muttered just loud enough for Ryan to understand.
“What’s that?”
“…You take a desire, like say “I Want To Have A Dog.” Then you cross out the vowels and repeating letters “WNHVDG.” Next, you reorganize them into a new shape that looks nothing like the remaining letters.” They then proceeded to draw in the air something that looked like a collapsing house with a few tree roots and two hooks protruding out of it. “Finally, you destroy the image be it through burning a piece of paper or removing yourself from the building you spray painted it on. Once it’s gone, concentrate on the memory of it every so often… three times a day, at most. Before you know it, the thing you want will come to you!” Fortunately for Alex, Ryan didn’t ask about the step he skipped.
“Neat. So what did you wish for?”
“…Wish? (Well, I suppose it’s a form of wishing…) I wished this whole city would just die.” As Alex said the word “die,” the pair accidentally bumped into a small group of women discussing where in the city it would be best to plant the garden. Naturally, it would have to be a small garden, but they supposed they’d have to start somewhere. After the pair apologized for their bumbling and the ladies walked off into the world, Ryan gave Alex a bemused look.
“Doesn’t look dead to me.”
“The death of a place isn’t just it being a barren wasteland. It’s the end of something that’s been around for far too long in favor of the start of something new. Something better. You’ve been here a week and you can’t honestly tell me this place hasn’t changed?”
“I suppose not.”
“Well, there you go! We all die little deaths every single day. None of us is ever the same as we were the day before. Some of us change drastically whilst others just breathe. Nonetheless, even the dead are prone to dying. We just call it decomposition. Death, even in its most monstrous forms, can be beautiful.”
“Hm… So what happened to her?”
“…Oh,” Alex sighed. “I found her an hour before the storm ended. She died. Slit her own throat in the middle of the street and nobody did anything about it.”
“I’m sorry. …Did she have a name?”
“Sara. Sara Hansen. Did you know her?”
“Can’t say that I had. The name sounds familiar though. Like I heard it in the wind.”
“Heh. She was like that. Always dancing in the dreams of those she would never know. She would laugh each night about a different joke she stole from someone who would never tell it. Sometimes, they were actually funny.” Alex sighed with a pinch of nostalgia. Before Ryan could ask if he was being metaphorical about the dream bit, Alex said, “Well, here we are.” They pointed to the building the pair was standing in front of. It was a modest building, only two floors to it. A few of the windows had been broken by the storm, but other than that it was functional enough to have some patrons in it. There were no markings on the building to indicate that it was q, bar a small sigil on the door that, if you squint, almost looks like a capital “q.” (Why it was called q and not Q, I can’t say.)
“Well, thanks for pointing me in the right direction.”
“Not a problem.” Ryan was about to enter the bar when a thought popped into his head. One that he hadn’t considered in the entire week he’d been in the city. It felt as if now was the only moment he could ever ask such a question, even if the urge to ask it would come again.
“Hey Alex!”
“Yeah?”
“What’s this city called nowadays? I’ve been so preoccupied that I never knew the new name for it.”
“Eleanor. But I think they’re gonna change it soon. They always do at times like these.” And then they melded into the newly crowded streets.
Ryan gave himself a small laugh at the mundane nature of such a name. He pulled out a cigarette from the ether and lit it with a snap of his fingers. With a puff of smoke surrounding his face, Ryan said, “Fare thee well, Eleanor. Fare thee well” before disappearing behind the doors of the bar.
“Our nation has always been a graveyard. It could be so much more…”11/17/2017-02/04/2019
-Scout Tafoya
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