The landlord had not lied, the water was cold—too cold.

But he could not complain, right?

The man had warned him of the results of waking up late, so this was his punishment, right?

Only, Elmer had not woken up late, it was just that the people in this apartment were barely humans. And even though he was yet to see a single person, with what had just occurred, he was now sure that they were here.

How could anyone have woken up so early to take their bath when their kind were meant to be asleep? Such an abnormality.

Through the round lenses of his glasses, Elmer gazed out of the bathroom’s window and up at the silver moon which was still hanging solemnly in the sky.

He bit down hard on his teeth in a slight frustration. He had even awoken before the moon had gone to sleep, and he had still missed the hot water. It annoyed him, but he was vexed even more because of his sister.

After dipping the sponge in his hand into the water filling the tub, he took Mabel’s arm and scrubbed it gently.

“Sorry about the water,” he apologized, another of the many apologies he had been giving her for years. If only she could answer him. “I’ll try to save enough for a pocket watch, maybe it’ll help me wake up earlier than this so you can use the hot water. You’d like that, right?”

When Mabel gave him no reply again, Elmer dropped the arm he was washing and picked up her other arm.

“I’m going to get a job in the city today. Remember Pip? Yes, the boy who used to tease you all the time.” Elmer laughed quietly, his voice echoing faintly off the bathroom’s porcelain walls and floor. “You were always so indifferent toward him.”

He sniffled, dropped her other arm and scrubbed her back.

“Well, he helped me find out about a lot of things. He mentioned that if I became a porter at the train station I could make at least five pence for each load. It depends though. If it’s a bigger load I could charge more.”

Elmer smiled, then stretched his hand from his sister’s back past her waist and went on to wash her thighs.

“I also have to compete against the other porters. The rich men would not want to hire a countryside boy like me to carry their things, that’s for sure—but I won’t give up, don’t you worry.” Elmer grinned widely. “Do you want a necklace? I’ll get you one once we have enough money. I’ll also save enough for a stove so I can keep cooking you some of my delicious meals.”

He paused for a moment before he continued, “But they’ll have to wait though. I need to first save as much as possible so I can enroll into the Church of Time’s college. Pip says I need at least a hundred mints to be able to enroll. I know it’s expensive, but I don’t have a choice, that’s the only way I can find a way to help you.”

Elmer left the sponge on his sister’s thigh, then continuously scooped water and poured it down her back.

“Don’t worry. I’m not going to become an Ascender. I will never become one of them.” Elmer sighed as his mood suddenly turned gloomy. “The only problem is how I’m going to make such money quickly. It almost seems impossible just by carrying bags. Wait. I must have told you about all these before, right? Ah, I think I’m already losing it.”

A gust of wind whooshed in from the open window, and it turned the cold water even colder, making Elmer shiver.

“Ugh. That’s it.” He stood up from the bathtub while holding Mabel firmly by her shoulders, helping her retain her sitting position so she would not fall as he left her back. “Time to leave.”

After he was out of the bathtub, he picked her up in a cradle into his arms, and carried her to the small wooden stool that stood near the sink.

Once he had placed her down to sit there, he dropped the sponge in his hand into the sink and took up the rough cotton towel that had been in it.

Deftly and quickly, he rubbed Mabel dry and put her gown over her body, then loosened her dark hair from the bun he had gathered it into.

By the time he was done clothing his sister, his own body had already dried up and he no longer had any need to towel himself.

He took his brown pants and tucked his legs into it, and after he was done buttoning them to his waist, he put on his cheap gray tunic. After which, he stuffed the towel and sponge beneath his armpit and picked his sister up, once again into a cradle.

Then he outstretched his hand slowly from beneath her, and grabbed hold of the dimly-lit candle holder on the edge of the sink, before walking to the door.

With a deep inhale, Elmer took in a massive amount of air to store in his mouth, before he pushed the door open and ran upstairs as though some carnivorous animal had been waiting for him beyond the door and had now begun to chase him.

Safely within the walls of room six, Elmer could now finally breathe. He took a moment for that, then he went ahead to place the candle holder on the table before putting Mabel back on the bed, her body as lifeless as ever.

After that, Elmer strolled to their suitcase across the empty and plain room.

He put down the towel and sponge, took out his suspender and fixed them on as soon as he was done tucking in his woolen tunic within the waist hem of his pants. Then lastly, he put his favorite ivy cap over his brown, tousled and spiky hair.

Standing before the opened window, he adjusted his glasses from its rim and looked up at the moon.

A scene he wished he could shut out suddenly crept through his mind, tightening his chest in an instant as well as filling him with a boiling rage, and with it came the words he had promised on that never-forgotten night:

I’ll kill you all… I’ll kill all of you and your God…

Elmer bared his teeth as he allowed his face to squeeze horribly in the silver light of the moon, his glasses doing nothing to hide the glint of wrath and frustration that had now come to be evident in his brown narrow eyes.

The fury came once in a while, and this morning had now become one of those whiles.

All of a sudden Elmer slapped his cheeks, and in a flash his face softened back to what it had been before a second ago.

“Not now, Elmer. You have a sister to take care of.”

He sighed and turned away from the window, walking back to the bed where his little sister laid.

He put his finger beneath her nose.

“Still breathing,” he murmured, then leaned over and kissed her forehead. “I’ll be heading out—”

Elmer suddenly cut himself from speaking as his eyebrows creased into a musing frown.

Was her hand like this before…? he thought as he noticed the fingers on Mabel’s right hand had been curled into a fist, all except for her forefinger which was sprawled outward.

Impossible… Elmer intoned. She’s not even blinked in years, there was no way she could have been…

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Elmer recalled his sister’s penchant for tapping with her forefinger whenever she was frustrated or excited. And the more he looked at her hand now the more his head filled with unreasonable thoughts.

It was not possible, there was no way she could have been tapping.

Elmer shook his head and mumbled, “Maybe it was when I put her down. Must have been me.” He could find no other explanation—at least a reasonable one—so he decided on this with a shrug.

Elmer pulled the rest of her fingers free before he picked up his bag, which was atop the bedside table, and strapped it to his waist.

After checking what little pence he had left within the bag, he took hold of the room keys, and with another glance at his sister, blew off the candle’s light, exited the room, and locked the door.

…

Phew…

Elmer exhaled after he successfully escaped the first floor’s choking smell of disaster.

Maybe he would have to tell the landlord to come and check it out, Elmer thought to himself. It was too much of a bother to just leave it be.

But then he realized that he had not even seen the landlord, he had only seen an eye.

Would that kind of person even leave his room? What if he was something like a monster? Elmer shivered, partially at the thought, and partially because of the cold, morning wind that had suddenly blown through him.

The streets were just as he had expected them to be: devoid of any traces of humanity. Well, the sun wasn’t up so it was still very early in the morning, maybe that was why—as if.

Elmer thought of how it had been yesterday, and adjusted his glasses in disapproval of his deduction.

The only thing different about the vicinity at the moment was that there were no eyes staring him down from apartment windows, and he was glad for that. But when he realized that he would have to walk all the way out of this area to be able to get a ride, his joy waned.

This place did not look like somewhere any coachman in his right senses would ride to without at least a passenger boarding already.

Elmer briefly remembered the steam car driver from the previous day and hissed. He was headed there, maybe he would meet the man again. He hoped not.

After a gentle tug of his suspenders, Elmer took down from the stairs, and with the hazy memory of the route the carriage he had boarded yesterday had taken, he traced his steps one at a time, hoping he wouldn’t get lost.

It took a while, but as the dark sky of early morning slowly brightened, then did Elmer finally find himself out of Tooth and Nails Street and before a thoroughfare.

Elmer had never been so glad to see people before, but when most of them suddenly turned around to behold him, they did not look to feel the same way.

There were a lot, most dressed in dirty gowns and patched pants, and tunics and shirts. And as the same chilly feeling he had felt on his back when he had wandered into Tooth and Nails street returned, Elmer understood.

So that was why it had been empty… Elmer told himself in realization and tsked. Explains the missing hot water as well…

He joined in with them, despite their stares. They probably did not like that there was now one more competitor who had arrived to reduce their source of income. Too bad, he had a little sister to feed and take care of.

After the childish few were done with their frantic grumbles, they all returned to gaze back at the road.

He already knew what they were waiting for—the ones that did not take their shot at trekking the distance of wherever they were headed—he too awaited the same thing. Only it was taking longer and longer, and it felt as though they might never come—the carriages.

Elmer was slowly losing his patience. Just like with the bathroom, it was the early bird that got the worm.

He would have tried trekking along with the others, but he saw no one heading down the path he had come through yesterday, and there was no way he would go at it alone. He could not even remember what exact route to take. There were twists and turns leading to the station.

Would he be late just like he had been early this morning? He could not have that. Hot water was one thing, money another, especially when he needed it for his sister. There was no time for this dawdling—

The public carriages arrived. Three galloped closer, and something Elmer had never seen before happened.

With clamors, everyone by the walkway—grownups and children alike—scampered about hastily to get the first carriages for themselves.

It turned chaotic quicker than how the train he had boarded had traveled.

He was startled, but he could not let himself fall behind. A single thought of Mabel sparked Elmer’s workaholic rage, one he never thought he had, and he joined in with them to hurry at the carriages.

The first took its passengers and galloped away. The second did the same, and so did the third. And Elmer was still standing by the walkway along with the other failed contenders.

At least none had gone down the road which led to Atkinson’s train station, that much was enough to calm him a bit. The ones who had boarded were not his competitors. Now he just had to board the next carriage quicker.

A while passed and the sun was starting to rise slowly, and still he had not yet succeeded in boarding a carriage. It was not easy, and now he was no longer relaxed.

Three carriages had galloped down the train station’s route already, each taking at least six people—counting those who had cuddled to the side of the coaches—and he was still here.

Should I try walking…? It’s going to save me from spending what I have left as well. Tch! I’ll only get lost if I go by myself… Elmer looked around. Why is no one even trying to trek down that route…?

He had to think of a way to board a carriage quickly. If he was going to spend what he had left on them, then he needed to be at the train station on time to make it back.

Elmer took off his cap, wiped the sweat that smeared his temples, and put it back on. There had to be a pattern to the carriages’ arrivals, he just had to be one step ahead of his competitors.

“I counted at least thirty carriages come and go,” Elmer muttered to himself as he now took off his glasses and wiped its lenses with his tunic, “that should be roughly about two carriages every three or four minutes.” He put his glasses back on, clenching his jaw shortly after. “If only I had a pocket watch or something, I would have been able to correctly time the next arrival. I’ll just have to count down myself if I fail to board the next ones again.”

The next two carriages came and he joined the hunt as he had been doing, though he still failed all the same. But as soon as they galloped away, Elmer counted down—he had waited here enough.

When his countdown crossed the two minutes mark, Elmer snuck down the walkway. No one paid any attention to him, and he was glad about that. This time he would not fail to board a carriage.

There were already at least eighteen people at the train station, and he did not take into account those who would have come from other areas, as well as the smartly dressed porters that would already be at the station. He was at a complete disadvantage.

Two-minutes-and-thirty-seconds, and no carriage yet. It was almost three minutes and none had still come. Elmer gradually felt as though some mystic forces were against his progress.

Maybe it was them? Those stupid Gods. Were they trying to punish him for saying he hated them all? He shook his head. That was a nonsense speculation.

Those Gods had no power over his life, and the carriage that would come as soon as his count stopped at exactly three minutes would prove that. Elmer hit his chest decisively.

Yes…

Ten seconds remained, and Elmer grew anxious. He was almost at the end of the walkway now, far away from the rest of the peasants who had started to look at him queerly.

Five seconds left, and his heart thumped rapidly.

The Gods had control over his life? He could not have that. He tightened his fist as his anxiety fired up.

Three minutes clocked and Elmer closed his eyes sharply in disgust with a grunt. But as his shoulders slumped down from the heavy weight of defeat, the whinny of a horse drew him back to the sole public carriage that was now trodding briskly down the road.

It’s still three minutes… Elmer assured himself as a smile crept upon his face. Of course, there was no way…

He was basking in his joy so much that he had almost forgotten he had a horde of competitors behind him.

Elmer snapped himself back quickly and jumped onto the road, widening his arms to force the carriage to an abrupt stop earlier than it was meant to, then he hurried to its side and gazed up at the coachman.

“Atkinson’s train station.” Elmer breathed hurriedly as the shouts and thumping feets of his competitors drew closer. “How much?”

“Ten pence,” the coachman told him.

“Eight,” Elmer bargained.

“Ten.”

“Nine?”

“Enough out of you,” the coachman voiced. “It’s either ten pence or leave.”

“Ten, it is.” Elmer jumped into the carriage with a smile on his face, and the coachman picked up the rest of his passengers before trodding off.