Samantha Micaels snuck through the weight of foreboding darkness. Storm clouds darkened the black of night into something tangible, something that left an aftertaste to one’s breath. The girl’s teeth tingled and wayward strands of her dark hair danced under the ominous pressure of a wave held at bay by nothing save mere anticipation, the electric dalliance of the tiger poised to pounce.
Sammy took a deep breath and grinned to herself. Such a perfect night.
The child moved cautiously along the shadowy west wall of Halley’s Hall, its classrooms long silent from their normal daytime activities. Now a different form of life was awake, both the shrubbery lining the path and dancing branches overhead taking on the sinister life of shadows. Monsters seen from the corner of one’s eyes, and the mystery of the uncertain lurked ready to seize upon the unsuspecting as they passed. And this was the world twelve year old Sammy dwelled in easily.
The small waif moved through the shadows with practiced ease, an insignificant shadow amongst the greater. Now she clutched a fold of that darkness, her cloak, to her back with one hand to keep it silent in the growing wind. The deep dark of the storm could conceal her well enough, but nothing could hide the careless. She grinned, white teeth visible briefly. Tonight promised at least decent loot, so she didn’t want to waste the opportunity.
She paused and moved into the void of an alcove of the building’s facade. She peered around. The last time she came skulking around the college campus they had nearly spotted her, so she needed to be extra careful.
Sammy stilled, her breathing becoming shallow and her eyes cast low. A couple came around the corner, walking hand in hand down the sidewalk. The man wore black pants and a collared shirt, while the woman wore a brightly patterned dress and high heels, her hair bundled tight on her head. She held her skirt wrapped tight with one hand as the wind tried to raise it.
They continued past Sammy, never aware of the child watching them. Sammy could hear snatches of their conversation, but did not really listen - inconsequential droll, in her opinion. The couple moved down a side path and stopped in front of one of the dorms, though Sammy could not see the dorm’s entrance, as it faced to her left.
The man laughed at something, the sound carrying to Sammy. They kissed for much too long Sammy thought, and then parted as the girl disappeared into the house. The man turned and retraced his earlier steps. Once he got to the main sidewalk, he pulled out a com-glyph.
“Hey, this is Brandon. You guys doing anything tonight? - Naw, nothing happened. Just a date. Still getting to know her, man. - Whatever. I’m serious about this one. She’s a good girl. - Yeah, whatever, anyway, anything going on? - Hah, thought so. ‘Kay, I’m coming over since I don’t have a class before ten tomorrow. - Yeah, yeah, see everyone in a few.” The man turned the corner and vanished as he stored the stone slab that contained the communication glyphs.
Sammy stared after him. She thought he seemed sort of nice, but not entirely. She wondered what it would be like to have a boyfriend. She shook her head. She did not trust anyone, and men less than most. Besides, she was only twelve so there were many years before that kind of thing would interest her. She was self-aware enough to know that, so the idea still captured her curiosity a bit. Well, she did not really trust anyone, so it was destined to remain nebulous curiosity, but if she could find someone like her dad, then it would be alright, right?
She whiled away time arguing with herself about the matter for several long moments, waiting. Finally a pair of campus guards passed, jabbering back and forth, not really paying attention to their surroundings. Sammy remained still, feral eyes watching her nemeses. They passed without any sign of noticing her and she gave a soft snort of derision. So easy, so easy.
Still, now she had some lee time since they only did their circuit every couple hours, if even. Sammy continued along the wall, her eyes and ears even more cautious than before, her motto being “when most confident and comfortable, be more vigilant, you idiot.” That motto had saved her far too many times to ever be discounted.
Reaching the end of the building, she glanced in every possible direction five times before making the risky, well lit trek to the next building. Finally satisfied, she abandoned all stealth and walked boldly across the sidewalk. All said and done, if you looked like you belonged with confidence, people tended to leave you alone.
Making it to the other side and into the shadows again without incident or witness, Sammy grinned to herself. Success once again for the great stealth warrior, Sammy the Great Skulker of Shadows, Supreme Master of Avoidance and all that rot.
She listened to the whisper of the ever increasing wind and felt the air grow thicker, ionized breath tingling her nose with its pleasant pre-storm scent. A crack made her jump as a branch on a nearby tree broke free and fell to the sidewalk. Several minutes later Sammy’s heart settled and she felt it safe to move again.
She glanced at the sign flickering as the wind howled, its private set of twin spotlights illuminating, “Braden University, He’age Hall, Life Studies.” Sammy nodded to herself. There should be good loot to be found here, stuff she needed to resupply her dwindling medical supplies.
Following the wall around behind the hall, she spotted the brick and fence enclave housing the garbage bins in the back parking lot. She knew the regular trash pickup happened early in the morning, so there should be plenty to pick from at the moment and the security glyphs would be disabled. A quick glance around and she sauntered boldly over to the gate.
Padlock.
“Dammit, who locks up their trash, anyway?” she grumped, but covered her mouth and looked around. “Sorry, Mommy,” she whispered. She would have to put a coin in her curse jar when she got home.
Climbing onto the hood of a car parked just close enough to the fence, the small girl jumped onto the ledge made by the bricks and grabbed the top of the wood fence. Two trash bins lay hidden inside the enclosure. Another quick glance around the parking lot showed no one, so she scramble over and dropped to the space between the nearest garbage bin and the fence.
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A sharp pain ripped into her leg and she staggered against the bin to keep from falling. Running her hand down her leg, she found her pant leg ripped. When she pulled her hand away, it felt sticky. Using a small flashlight, she checked more carefully. The child let out a sigh of relief. Fixable. These were her best and only pair of pants at the moment, so this was a great relief to her. A scrape down her leg oozed blood along the path of the rip, but nothing serious. She would deal with that later.
Sammy glanced at the watch her mother had given her on her seventh birthday: 2:15 AM. She would spend about forty minutes in each bin and then make her escape. So determining, she raised one of the two lids on the first bin.
“Ha, jackpot,” she said in a quiet voice, bags piled to the brim. She scrambled in and began breaking bags open, starting with the lowest ones she could reach. As she found useful items, an unused bandage in this discarded package, a bottle of disinfectant with a little bit still left, a stained reusable bandage and many other treasures, she put them into her cloth loot bag.
The wind picked up and threatened to blow the loose trash from the bin so Sammy jammed a piece of cardboard into the bin’s latch and lowered the lid. If trash started blowing around, someone might come to investigate.
Checking her watch again, she snorted at herself. She had spent too much time in this one. Still, she had found a good amount of things she needed, so she felt vindicated. She slipped out of the first bin, making sure it latched properly after clearing the cardboard.
The wind howled over the enclave, swirling around the bins. Sammy jammed the latch to the second, half full bin and climbed inside. She started once again to break into the lowest bags, this time able to reach to the bottom of the bin easily.
“Hurry up. It’s going to start soon and I don’t want to get wet,” a man said.
Sammy froze. Not good, she thought. She burrowed under trash even as the lid to her bin raised and three new bags dropped on top of her.
A second voice said, “Blast it all. Just a moment, the latch is jammed. There. Just some trash.” The lid slammed down. “Let’s leave the gate unlocked. I don’t want to come back later for the trash men. The storm . . . .” Sammy lost the rest of his words as the gate crashed shut.
A flash of lightning lit the cracks of the trash bin, followed almost instantly by a long, loud crack of rumbling thunder and the drum of rain. Sammy waited for several minutes, but then scrambled out of the trash and pushed the lid open to peek out.
The lid warped a little, but did not otherwise move as it ought. A stab of fear pricked her heart. Sammy pushed harder. The lid did not move. Panic set in. Sammy banged on the lid and yelled, “Help.” I don’t want to be taken away by the trash men, she thought through tears. “I’m not trash,” she screamed, weeping and thrashing around and pushing on both lids.
The second lid flew open to crash against the fence behind it. Sammy froze for a startled moment, but then stood up and looked around, wiping her tear streaked face and eyes as the heavy rain drenched her. “Stupid idiots. Should have told me the other lid wasn’t latched.”
No longer trapped, her panic vanished. She jammed the latches on both lids this time and continued her search for loot. The new bags added both useful and cool looking items to her mounting loot count and Sammy felt lucky that those two men had thrown them away just then, when all was said and done anyway.
Climbing free of the bin and making sure all the lids latched properly, Sammy climbed on top of a bin and peeked over the enclosing walls, the whipping wind and heavy rain obscuring the nearby building. Satisfied, Sammy used the latch string to open the gate and slipped out into the parking lot.
Abandoning her stealth trek, she headed directly off campus. Out in the upper city proper, the girl child found the street runoff drain she planned to use overflowing with rainwater. Sammy dropped into the water and rolled down through the opening to drop into the underground sewers.
Climbing to one of the walkways, she shivered in the cool underground air. Using her flashlight, she ran through the causeways and through various side tunnels and pipes. Finally she exited a culvert of corrugated metal that emptied high under the old Foghorn Bridge into the Damsy River. The rising storm water threatened to drag her away and throw her to the river below, but she braced herself with hands and feet on both curved walls to stay clear of its powerful grip.
A quick glance around the bridge’s semi-protected undergirth showed no one taking shelter under the ancient bridge. Not really surprising. Depending on the rumors one bought into, this place was either haunted or cursed. It made no real difference the label to the superstitious street people. They all avoided it, even during storms like this one. Perhaps even more so during such sinister storms as this one.
Sammy grinned. It worked well for her, since she liked being safely hidden from all prying eyes. Of course, she did not rely wholly on the bridge’s reputation, but it helped all the same.
The young girl swung clear of the drain pipe with its ever rising runoff. Scrambling upwards, she clambered onto the large pipes running the bridge’s underside. Finally the street child crawled all the way to the far side of the bridge’s expanse on those self-same under-pipes.
Coming to where the pipes entered the earth on the far side of the bridge, she touched the ancient glyph hiding the small trapdoor to her hidden refuge, the place she called home. It lit up as usual at her touch. A moment later the door appeared and the drenched girl scrambled through. She paused long enough to make sure the entrance way sealed properly behind her before crawling through the entrance tunnel. The tunnel soon opened into an ante-chamber and she stood up.
The room contained a desk, some bookcases and some beds, plus other small furnishings both inherited and collected over the last two years to make the place warm, cozy and her own. She did not think whatever ancient had built the place would mind her use of the room, even if they had still been alive.
Safe in her home once again, Sammy grinned and declared with a song in her voice, “Another successful pillaging of the treasure troves. Yes, Sammy the Awesome once more has vanquished all comers to return with piles of loot and great glory.”
Taking her black loot bag, the child dumped its contents into an open wooden crate she used for sorting. She pulled out any bottles and set them to the side. She would combine their contents with her current stock later. She put each of the other prizes into their proper places, most of the items being rather common and things she needed.
But not everything. Several items could be sold to give her a little spending money. Several sharp knives, even surgeon tools, an arm splint, a box of surgeon masks.
But the prize of the night had to be the bronze colored, woven cloth collar she had pulled from the last bag. It looked like a wide dog collar with bronze sizing holes down its entire length. Several crystals and gems were woven into the collar’s length between the sizing holes. The design made it so the crystals and gems would touch skin whether worn one way or the other.
But more than any of that, the tingling Sammy felt in her fingers and the back of her eyes held her interest. Sammy knew this feeling well, having experienced it many times in the ancient sewers and with her parents when they were alive - glyph magic.
She inspected the collar for the glyphs, always fascinated by the ability to store magic in something so simple as a few marks set in a particular way. It was her personal hobby to collect such glyphs, despite the inherent danger. She would so have to figure out how to write these down.
She grinned with anticipation, but then sighed. She was pretty tired, so she thought she should sleep before doing anything else for the night. After taking a bath and tending to her leg, she snuggled into her bed, her mind running over the events of the night.
As her mind dimmed toward sleep and perhaps because of the wound on her leg, she started remembering things from back when she first ran away from the foster parents that stupid social worker had foisted on her.