Iam’s mind raced as he drove home. The manila folder sat in the passenger seat, and his gaze wandered to it often. The check for the ‘loan’ had been stapled to the bottom of the page, and the money dominated his mind. A large part of him screamed to take the money and tell Jackson to shove off and get his life in order. A smaller, more insistent part of him hesitated. It felt like running away, and he’d been doing that his whole life. Would it be so bad to keep the job and use the money to upgrade his living situation? The giant truck barely fit in the gravel lot in front of his apartment, but he did the best he could to leave room for his neighbors.

For the first time in forever, he held his head up as he made the walk to his door. The apartment had looked run down when he moved in two years ago, but now it looked dilapidated. The building was only a single story, with one unit to each corner. Iam was pretty sure it had been a business before being repurposed as dwellings. The roof sat at a shallow slant, and instead of shingles, it was covered in tar. The AC units were mounted on the roof, and several unaccounted for vent pipes poked out of the tar. The white paint peeled away from the siding in irregular patches, and despite the many complaints to the landlord, wasp nests littered the roof’s overhang. Iam fingered the folder in his hand. The money could facilitate a colossal change and give him a real home—his first since leaving the Millers.

He had to push the door back and forth as he worked the key to the deadbolt. When the lock released, the stubborn door refused to open, and Iam resorted to a shoulder block. His momentum propelled him past the now open door and into the living room. Now that he was home, he had no idea what to do. The day had been the oddest he had in a very long time. He couldn’t remember a time when he’d been so out of sorts...except for the day he’d gotten the call. He leaned back against the door and slumped to the floor. The first tears fell before his butt hit the carpet.

It turned out Iam wasn’t a good crier. Instead of sobs and wails, he whimpered. Damn, he couldn’t even get being sad right. The thought made him laugh. How messed up did a person have to be to suck at sadness? The tears didn’t stop, though, and Iam resorted to punching his thigh. The punches started soft but escalated into haymakers that were likely leaving bruises. Abruptly, Iam stopped and stood. None of this was getting him anywhere. If he wanted to use that money to buy a place, he needed to prove he could take care of the one he had.

Determination filled him as he went into the kitchen. Reaching under the sink for a trash bag, all he found was an empty box. He searched the cupboards until he found a massive wad of plastic bags from various stores. It would have to do.

The bedroom was mostly a mass of dirty clothes, so he moved into the bathroom. Iam threw everything away without much thought for what it was until he came to a bottle of whiskey that still contained a significant amount. Throwing that away would be a waste of good money, so he set it aside. By the time the floor was clean, Iam had a small collection of different liquor bottles which contained too much to justify trashing. It wasn’t lost on Iam that the bottles started being less and less full, the threshold for saving them lowering with each new discovery. Some of the bottles only had a swig or two left in them, so he started draining them as he found them. It was only responsible, after all.

A loud klaxon boomed in Iam’s ears. Captain Picard’s voice demanded shields up, and lasers fired off. Iam raised his head and winced. Empty bottles rolled around as he shifted his weight as much as he dared. Just how many had he emptied? The alarm recycled, the red alert eating at Iam’s brain. He hated Star Trek and had picked the ringtone precisely because of that. The reason for the alarm hit Iam like a truck.

“Crap,” he moaned.

The words hurt as his lips were dry and cracked. His mouth was dry and tasted like a bar mat. With exaggerated slowness, he crawled to his bed where his phone was and swatted at it. It finally fell to the floor, and Iam managed to turn off the alarm. He looked between the phone’s clock and his shower. Be on time or be clean? Iam really wasn’t up to making even that simple a decision. What ultimately tipped the scales was that the front door was less work to reach than a round trip to the bathroom.

Iam wobbled as he stood, a tiny monkey clanging cymbals inside his head. His stomach heaved, and for a moment, he thought a trip to the bathroom was going to be necessary whether he wanted it or not. He pushed his nausea back with a supreme effort of will and managed to open the front door. The early morning sun was still in refraction, so Iam managed an eyeful before the bright orange light intensified his headache. The salt air hit his nostrils, and the tight hold he had on his stomach failed. Vomit spilled onto his stoop, and he rolled away, trying to keep it from his clothes. One of his neighbors, possibly Mr. Jenkins, came out, made a disgusted noise, then went back inside. Definitely Mr. Jenkins—the man was so fucking judgmental.

The drive to Jack’s Asphalt was as miserable as Iam feared. Nausea forced him to pull over multiple times, but by the time he pulled into Jack’s parking lot, all he had left were dry heaves that hurt his stomach and throat. A half-full bottle of water had been left in the truck, and Iam swigged it down, hoping some of the foul bile smell would go with it. Jackson met him at the door, looking him up and down.

“Have a good time?” he asked.

Iam pulled on the handle and pushed, but Jackson didn’t budge. The truck’s door opened slightly before bouncing off one of the man’s massive thighs. Jackson smiled, then gently pushed on the door until it latched. He strode around to the passenger side and got in.

“Well,” he said, “let’s go.”

“I just came to drop off the truck,” Iam said, trying hard to open his mouth as little as possible. “And get my car.”

“No can do,” Jackson said. “Can’t get onsite in a personal vehicle.”

“Don’t you get it,” Iam snarled? “I’m quitting.”

He tried to open the door, but Jackson hit the lock button. Iam unlocked the truck, but Jackson was faster locking it back than Iam was at opening the door. What followed was a game of reflexes that Iam had no hope of winning. Finally, Iam slammed a fist onto the steering wheel.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

“Let me out of here!”

“No,” Jackson said simply.

“I swear to god, if you don’t let me out, I’m going to—”

“Going to what?” Jackson interrupted, finally showing some anger. “Breathe on me?”

“Please, just let me go?” Iam begged.

“No,” Jackson said. “I thought I made my position clear yesterday. You’re not in control of what happens anymore. If you want to slink off and die, I’m going to make sure it’s for a purpose, not drowning pointlessly in a bottle.”

“You can’t force me to do anything,” Iam snarled. “Now, let me out!”

“Can’t I?” Jackson said.

Jackson’s eyes glowed with a faint blue light. He stared at Iam, who backed away. For the barest moment, Iam saw images swirl in Jackson’s irises. They were of him walking out of a liquor store. Jackson held Iam’s gaze, and the picture changed. Now, he was lying on a sidewalk, a bottle of clear alcohol next to his outstretched hand. He croaked an unintelligible word before his eyes closed. The images vanished, and the blue light in Jackson’s eyes changed to red before fading to the darkest black Iam had ever seen.

“What the hell,” Iam mumbled.

“That money isn’t salvation, Mr. D’Mann. Without help, it’s a one-way ticket to oblivion.”

“How the hell do you know about that?” Iam asked.

“Not important,” Jackson said. “You have come to the rim of the crucible, Mr. D’Mann.” Jackson’s words were formal and stern, but a hint of sorrow laid behind them. “This is the tipping point, the first test. Will you fall into it and be transformed, or will you fall outside and die?”

“Crucible? Test? What are you talking about? I just want to go home.”

Jackson unlocked the door and stared at Iam. No light shone in his eyes anymore, and his expression was utterly devoid of emotion. Iam’s muddled mind tried to catch up, but the hangover fogged his thoughts. Supposedly, he wasn’t in control anymore, but Jackson was clearly giving him a choice. That, along with whatever the test nonsense was, implied he was in control. At least, a little. For whatever reason, Iam knew if he left the truck right then, Jackson wouldn’t stop him, and they’d never meet again. But, those visions, were they real?

“What’s the difference?” he mumbled, despair falling on him like a veil.

“No more or less than the difference between meaning and meaningless,” Jackson said. “Leave, and you live and die, a meaningless existence, mourned by few and remembered by no one. Stay, and your death and life will have meaning.”

Iam hadn’t intended to ask his question out loud, but the answer Jackson had given him was anything but helpful. Everything Jackson said sounded like malarky, but Iam couldn’t ignore the oddities that seemed to cling to the man. And those visions…him lying on the ground with no more comfort than an out-of-reach bottle, alone and dying. It was his greatest fear given form. Iam shivered.

“So, I die either way?” he asked.

“As do we all,” Jackson said.

The silence stretched. Iam lost track of time as he ran events through his mind. Several times, he opened his mouth to ask a question, but they either seemed too ridiculous, or he was too afraid to give them voice. He was sure in either case he wouldn’t understand the answers. The only thing he knew for sure was something else was at play here. How could Jackson know about the money? How had he sent that man scurrying away yesterday, and where had those visions come from? Independently, they could be passed off as mind tricks, but they told a different story collectively. The question at the forefront of his mind was whether the story was malevolent or benevolent. Jackson seemed sincere in his desire to help, but by his own admission, wasn’t doing to by choice.

“Where are we going?” Iam asked, finally.

Jackson opened his door. “Inside.”

“Inside?” Iam grumbled. “Then what was the whole point of this?” He spread his hands to encompass the truck.

“You tell me?” Jackson said.

“How the hell should I know that?” Iam said.

“Think about it. When you figure it out, let me know.”

Iam grumbled more as he opened the door and stomped behind Jackson into the office. As before, they passed through the air-conditioned office and into the sweltering hallway. Jackson led him into the office where his interview had taken place and sat down. Without the pressure of the interview, Iam looked more closely at the space. The desk was still piled high with papers, but the walls held an eclectic selection of decorations.

The Texas flag was prominent on every wall, but shadow boxes held a wide array of Indian arrowheads, figurines, dolls, and tassels. The wall directly behind Jackson had a pair of old west six-shooters and a bandolier full of large-caliber bullets. A sombrero hung above them, covered in red dust that obscured the hat’s design. Looking closer, Iam noticed the red dust covered the bandolier and bullets, but the guns were clean. In the far right corner was a totem pole that rose to the ceiling.

It was a mostly unsculpted log about eighteen inches in diameter. The bottom third had totems carved into it, but they looked distinctly modern. The images were distorted into caricatures, but a cell phone was plainly evident, as was a truck, a facsimile of a brain, and a stop sign. Iam couldn’t make out some of the totems, but there were four distinct layers, with the totems growing more prominent than the ones on the layer below.

“A friend of mine made it for me,” Jackson said, following Iam’s eyes. “It’s not done yet, though.”

“Seems disrespectful,” Iam said. “Isn’t that cultural appropriation or something?”

“Don’t let Falling Sparrow hear you say that. He takes his heritage seriously, and I don’t think he’d like being called a fake Indian.”

“I didn’t call him fake,” Iam said. “I don’t even know who he is.”

“Well,” Jackson said, “you can’t appropriate something you own, and he made it, sooo.”

“Whatever,” Iam said. “Did I pass the test or whatever?”

“Not for me to say,” Jackson said.

“If not you, then who?” Iam asked.

“We’ll get back to that,” Jackson said. He opened a drawer and tossed a small, white, rectangular object to him. It had a small tube on one edge and an LED screen on the side. “I’m sure you know what that is. When the alarm sounds, blow into it. If it ever reads more than point-oh-six, there will be consequences.”

“You’ll fire me?” Iam asked.

“Certainly not,” Jackson said. “When I told you this job didn’t require brains, I didn’t mean literally. You really need to pay more attention.” He pulled out a small flask and tossed it over. “This is to get you through the day. Each week there will be less and less in there. The foreman knows to let you have it, so don’t worry about that.”

“It won’t work,” Iam said. “I’ve tried weaning myself before.”

“Trust me,” Jackson said, his smile wide, “you’ve never faced the kind of consequences I have in store for you. It’ll work.”

“Whatever you say,” Iam said.

“Normally,” Jackson said, “one of those consequences would be to work while you’re hungover, but the crew you’re on is on an overnight job. Be here at nine. Oh, and here.” Jackson held out the key to Iam’s car. “It was a pretty simple fix, and our mechanics are top-notch.”

Iam took the key and left without answering. His Camry was parked in the front lot, and the first thing he noticed when he opened the door was the lack of a squeak. The interior had been cleaned, the tattered seats replaced, and the battery in the floorboard was gone. The car started on the first try, and Iam reflexively tapped the gas to keep it idling. The engine revved, and when Iam let off the gas, the idle was smooth. Then, the AC hit him. Iam jumped at a tap on his window.

“I need the truck keys,” Jackson said.

Iam fished the keyring out of his pocket and handed it over. “How?”

Jackson laughed. “Do you know how many junkyards there are in Corpus? I told you our mechanics are top-notch. Of course, we’ll deduct the repairs from your checks, but it wasn’t much.”

“Uh, thanks,” Iam said.

He drove away, enjoying the smooth ride and AC.