Rule 4

Count Your Change & Avoid Snacking Food

Statement: When we earn money, we think of buying televisions, cars, games, or paying bills. Mostly paying bills. Here we earned money and at each corner the employees reiterated the grand prizes waiting for us toward the end. Yet, if we were intended to spend money on prizes–why did they make the line so insanely long?

An addict wants to get their fix quickly. A desperate person needs enough to pay off their debts. All these actions were designed to lure our inquisitive natures in. We explored ways to earn more cash, such as watching people use an exit. They were weeding us out, separating the questioning and nosey from those whose hearts weren’t into solving a mystery.

The line jumped by in clumps. Drug induced dreams were often disjointed but this event had too much going on to be purely a construct of my mind. At least, I thought it did. But every time my eyes opened the scene changed a little.

I stared at my small card. The numbers on it were up to six hundred and thirty eight. Math would be impossible to apply correctly. Each time my brain attempted to add two and two, I got a greek beta symbol in response. It meant nothing.

Belatedly, I started connecting the dots. It happened with each pause, as I watched three more people quit and earned more money. At times I came to, finding myself studying the distant skyline that was visible through a window on the second floor. Yet, the line kept going on, impossibly huge and twisting in ways that made no sense.

I grew attached to the idea of this being a strange dream. That comforted me while I watched a man violently shake a vending machine. The memory of him walking up to the machine was vague, as if I’d watched through a thick fog. My eyes drifted and I tried to understand what was happening.

“Give me my food!” the unknown man yelled. He wore a backward ball cap and jersey. His belly stuck out from a pair of pants multiple sizes too small. I shuddered with disgust. “I’m really hungry! What’s with this machine, why doesn’t it take dollars?”

“Careful, that machine eats your money,” another person said. “My friend up ahead lost ten bucks on it.”

“What the fuck is wrong with this place? I mean five bucks for a bag of chips? What a rip off,” he shouted and slammed his palms onto the glass front, rocking the machine.

Metal slowly slid along the vending machine’s outer shell, crawling up from the back like a budding flower. The man paid it no heed, instead he shook the offending object more. I raised a hand from the crutch, blinked, and the man was gone.

A dozen possible ideas muddled their way through my thoughts but none were certain. The card had increased in value. Seven hundred and six dollars now sat on the balance. I determined that my own thirst could wait. Food and water cost money, money was important. That much was lodged into every part of my brain, except for the ones chanting ‘follow the rules’ and ‘don’t listen to the rules.’

We kept walking. My body jerked and hand grasped at the crutch in response to a startling shout. Handrails were bolted to a wall on one side, and a rest area on the other with very welcoming seats.

“Hey!” a loud voice ahead of me shouted again. He continued, “You little brat. Give me back that money!”

The line in front of me rippled as people bent away from a sudden outburst. Birds avoiding a hawk couldn’t have moved better. I, on my crutches, fell back, gasping for support and pointing the end toward anyone who dared get too close. A few people glanced my way but they were glassy-eyed.

“Give that back! What? Where are you! No! Give me your card!” the man bellowed demands while pushing his way through the crowd. People were knocked over and a large person who reminded me of a pig barged out past me.

Post Note: He was just fat. Extremely so. Technically he could have been three of me. When this man barreled through the crowd people crumpled.

“Where?” the burly man demanded of the crowd. A few people pointed, others blinked, and I waved my support stick at all of them, in case they got funny ideas.

A second figure, much thinner and to my left, charged away. The heavyset man bolted after him.

My heart pounded faster than their fading footsteps. I turned to follow the robber’s movement. All at once, pandemonium broke out. People ran around yelling at each other. The crowd burst again as a dozen individuals fought over objects.

I pocketed my card quickly in case anyone decided to pick on a cripple.

The crowd’s madness increased. I kicked myself up against the wall under wooden handrails. My body paled as people punched and clawed. Someone with baggy pants fell back on me and kicked wildly. Fingers ached from a death grip upon my crutches. I pushed the man back.

My armpits were sore and worn. The line had been longer than I realized. Such pain only came after hours of using them to prop myself up. A dozen other worries flashed through once I realized how long it had been.

Hunger hit. My body shook. I sat on the floor pointing my crutches in wavering defense like a panicking madman. They eyed me. Some stepped closer. Two approached me but fought each other instead. I groaned in pain from the pressure on my hips and abrupt fall. My foot lashed toward a person getting too close.

My mouth hung open. No words came out. I scanned the crowd for signs of sanity. None of the people near me resembled those from earlier blips of awareness. There were no friends or family members. Energy flooded my body, starting from the base of my spine then tickling neck muscles. People edged closer while flailing. Most wore the same dead gaze.

Another man reached out for my crutch. I smacked him. Someone dodged in from the side and grabbed the extended tip. His eyes widened and mouth hung open. I bonked him with the other crutch, which spun me onto my side. My fingers lost their grip. A third figure swooped in, took my support, and ran off.

I scrambled after him but failed to get ahold of the thief. My arms clasped around the remaining crutch and fingers tightened. Water dripped from my eyes. I flailed, hitting three people in their legs. A woman crumpled next to me and scrambled to get away. Her eyes wide with fear and insanity.

“Stay away!” I croaked. My voice felt unused and body awash with adrenaline. “Back, you mindless zombies.” I voiced the first insult that came to mind. “I need these to walk. I need to walk.”

The world slowed down. Shadows grew longer. Peoples’ steps faltered. Hot breath tingled at my ear and a small hand touched my shoulder.

A woman whispered in my ear, “You need to walk? Do you value legs as much as gossamer wings? It saddens me to see an Underwood so hapless among the wolves of iron.”

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

I spared her a glance and saw a sharp-toothed woman with puffy hair. She might have been the same one from the bus, or it could have been one of an endless army. I wondered if my pills had been laced, or the water from our neighborhood. But those thoughts turned murky.

She moved in a single motion that blurred uncomfortably. Time resumed normal speeds as people around us hushed while backing up. They were scared of the girls, and some clutched objects as tightly as I grasped the remaining crutch.

“What do we have here?” a second woman demanded. Her words carried strongly through the area, holding a nasty tone of disapproval.

“I’ll sell you this crutch?” a normal person asked. I say normal because she wore a thin top and pajama bottoms with video game characters printed on them. “What will you offer for it?”

The green-eyed stewardess flowed over to the pajama wearer. Her nose wrinkled. It was the first time I’d ever seen one of them truly unhappy. I suspected it was because of her mistaken impression of my family name.

“No deal, unfortunately. That is not yours. We don’t steal or lie. We barter or bribe and certainly cheat, but stealing is something only a base Neanderthal does. And liars, liars are filth. Liars caused this—”She held very still. The other two green-eyed girls turned toward their spokeswoman. Their hands quickly covered mouths wide from horror.

There had been a secret there, one not to be freely given like their earlier advice. Plus, she was defending me while insulting the other person. She shook her head. They relaxed as tight shoulders loosened.

The thief pointed at me. “But he’s crippled. He can’t possibly…” Her gaze faltered. She held keys in her other hand. Liquid dripped from their edges. I suspected she had fought the original boy who stole the crutch.

“Rules are rules. Here, in this place, it is not your choice to give away another’s things. You can buy it for money, then sell it for money. You can bargain and exchange favors. I believe you’ll find two people over there, mid copulation, for twenty dollars. They seem to be having fun and making a deal in the process!”

All three bobbed their heads in unison. They reminded me of old women nodding to a frothing pastor. My brother used the exact same gesture during a powerful sermon.

The thief said, “But—”

“Now, now. Behave,” they said in unison while waggling their fingers.

“Or don’t,” another set responded.

I turned quickly, still on the ground, to see the other women. Six different ladies and a broken gaggle of tourists were hard to take in all at once. My head flipped back and forth to watch the odd duplicates of each other argue. They stood close together and had the same curled lips, clothes, and toothy grins. Only their eyes and hair were different for reasons unapparent to me.

“Rules must be followed,” one of the green-eyed girls insisted. Her eyebrows lowered at the same time.

“That is true.” The yellow-eyed ones with scarves smiled widely, showing more teeth than a normal human should have—to say nothing of their sharpness. Their tone was a bit sharper and higher pitched. I could hear the differences since they were all close by.

“Follow the rules, behave while in line. Reach an end,” all six said.

I twitched at the grating sound of so many people echoing the same words. A pulling sensation caused my head to dip. I clutched my lone support, pulling it tight to my chest while lying on the floor. The closer it was, the clearer my mind felt.

They’d never given me back my other crutch despite making a fuss over it.

People milled around as the line reformed. I had no clue what was happening. They acted like clueless sheep. My thoughts fought to stay above the fog while others clearly fell victim to an unknown power. In that we were different. I couldn’t tell if it was the solidarity of having a crutch or simply its material. I suspected it to be the material.

An army of stewardesses offering money to people in exchange for items certainly was suspicious. The crutch helped me see clearly. Slowly I pieced more together. Every time I’d come to I’d been holding onto the actual metal, not the padding.

I did not know what might cause such an effect. Speculation led me to believe the substance itself warded off whatever effects were tackling the crowd. Alternately, it could have simply been a hyper awareness due to paranoia about spilling onto the ground.

All around me people shuffled forward once more. I turned to check outside but the window I’d been passing before was gone. We were in a giant mall with stores of some sort. Many people walked by automatically. Others held their cards like greedy children and went inside.

Time blurred. I found myself sitting on the ground staring at my hands. My crutch lay next to me. No one touched or tried to steal it. A few people shook their heads and hopefully decided further theft attempts were pointless. I slowly pushed myself upright while grunting from unmuted pain. My body wobbled, and after a long pause to gather strength, I merged with the line once more.

People passed by me quickly. Each step hurt. At the corner stood one of the green-eyed girls. “You’re taking a long time,” she said as I approached.

Her words made me pause at the corner. I winced while assembling my thoughts slowly. She tilted her head and smiled, not bothering to hide the teeth. Either she didn’t care that I knew, or wanted to remind me of her inhumanity. Or, and this was the option I hoped for, she was simply messing with me and at the end this would turn out to be a strange reality television show.

Then I recalled the giant wall of dark which had been drawing closer.

“Something bad happens to those who wait too long, doesn’t it?” I asked.

Her lips stretched thin from a large smile. The stewardess handed me a ten dollar bill and cocked her head in the other direction. It reminded me of a wild animal, or a dog, studying a piece of food.

“There are benefits to waiting,” she said. A glint in her eyes distracted me and I lost two places as people walked around me.

Post Note: The inhuman stewardess with green eyes did not solely mean benefits to me, or any of us. Likely she said it in such a way that I would infer there are benefits to me if I delay. Standing in this line made us hungry. Vending machines give food for money at exurbanite prices. The exchange is brutal but will power and physical training can overcome some effects. This means the exchange is choice based. It is likely both are true. Waiting had benefits to us, and them.

“You’re not human,” I mumbled.

“You’ve said that. I’m afraid we don’t award for duplicate observations. Unless you have another mystery to note?”

My mind drifted and her body fuzzed out for a moment. Hunger pains threatened to drive me insane. At the least, I needed water soon.

“No,” I said and crutched off rapidly. My small burst of energy didn’t last long. Despite traveling over twenty feet, the green-eyed stewardess could still be heard tittering behind me.

A fresh wave of pain hit. I huffed repeatedly, bracing the remaining crutch and semi-decent leg. For a moment, I truly considered letting go of the edge so that all my body’s hurts would fade away. Then I remembered the man who’d walked into the exit sign and been torn apart. I could recall how eager they were to give me money for even a single statement. They were wearing us down.

Post Note: I was not proud of this moment. I knew the haze would be dangerous. The people around me were a pack of wolves but that did nothing to stop me from being mentally weak. I can only say that pain drove me to be afraid. In that, I was a slave to my flesh.

I fought through the hunger and thirst. I couldn’t walk right without the crutch. The gnawing feeling grew in intensity. So, I finally braved one of the vending machines.

Others were in line to get food and water. Everywhere in the place involved lines and there were no exceptions. I studied them, and none of them had the same problem as the person I’d seen earlier.

I took my turn, and raised my card carefully after checking the people behind me multiple times. No one rushed in. No one tried to grab my card. The debt holder slid down. I pressed buttons for a bottle of water. The vending machine purred, literally, then popped out a bottle of water.

In the back of the vending machine, behind rows of food, a wide smile appeared. The grin made me backup a few steps, and once I did, the expression in the box’s rear vanished as if it had never been. I tilted to the left, and right, checking for extra arms or metal poles sliding along the sides. Nothing moved.

Instead, I saw a window that looked over an endless sea of people. I shuffled to the side, ignoring the ever moving line, and studied the world outside.

I looked out over an endless crowd once more and realized exactly how many people were here, still. Millions, if not more, were lined up on an endless mess that couldn’t possibly be real, but it was. There were too many people milling around that were varied, detailed, and interacting in ways that were beyond my imagination. This could not be a simple dream.

For a long time, I wondered if the water might be contaminated, or if there was a point to drinking it. But there were tons of people out there and the line crept forward inches at a time. I needed to drink or I might not survive. Choosing not to eat would end with me crawling along and making muddled decisions. Spending money to satiate myself would cost me chances at these prizes. I also suspected the ‘debt card’ was not a mistake of communication.

In truth, my actual thoughts were hardly objective. There were a jumbled and confusing mess all tied together with laces of panic. I struggled to keep myself detached because worry would slow me down.

But it was impossible not to feel some emotions. Especially once I realized there were more people here than my town could possible support alone. I knew, with certainty, that I would not make it to my brother’s tomorrow. My family might be in the crowd as well. Unless they had taken an exit, as so many others had.

I gulped down another sip of water and struggled not to think about situations well beyond my control.