Chapter 25: Market Basing

II

“Do you think he’s dead?” a rather rough and apathetic voice asked, poking at my limp body with a foot.

“He’s pretty pale, don’t suppose he has much by the look of him,” another man said from further up the snowy alley, dismissing me out of hand.

“Still, it's worth searching him,” a third voice stated, clearly the leader of the band of ruffians.

I groaned as the world rushed into existence, my head aching like crazy. The man, who had been about to search through my pockets, yelped at the disturbance. My vision swam as I looked about at my predicament. The ne’er-do-well coughed gruffly to cover the embarrassing outburst.

“Where am I?” I asked, looking up at the three slightly intimidating men. They were wearing mostly black rags, their faces covered by a corner of cloth. The sky overhead was dark and it was difficult to make out more of their appearance.

“Turn out ya pockets,” the tallest and best dressed of the three demanded in his authoritative voice. The other two had seemed hesitant upon finding me alive but he was unphased. With his declaration, the others’ demeanours hardened; they turned to me as if to back up his demand.

Not really understanding what the man was saying, so dazed and confused was I, I continued narrating my thoughts aloud, “Who am I?” I didn’t really know. “What is this?” I asked no one as I scooped up some snow and let it fall between my fingers.

Upon seeing the three men I had felt afraid, they were far larger and stronger than me but the white and fluffy stuff had completely stolen my attention and it was as if the thugs no longer existed.

Cold, compressible, melty…. This is snow? I thought, not quite sure of the fact.

The stern posture of the second man, the one who wasn’t incharge and hadn’t been about to rob me, faltered.

“I’m not sure about this…” he said, unsure. “The church of purity says it’s a sin to harm the insane,” he went on, his body language hesitant as he played with his fingers nervously. There was a moment of indeterminable silence between the three, which I was completely oblivious to as I examined a body that was unfamiliar yet somehow my own.

Smack! I flinched at the sudden noise as my attention was, once again, drawn back to the trio of criminals. I looked up from my prone position at the scene. As far as I could tell, the leader of the three had just dealt a clout to the less certain member.

“You idiot!” he bellowed, clearly angry. I was scared by the sudden display of emotion and curled up in an attempt to hide, not yet in control of my body enough to run away.

“I’ve told you time and again to stop going to that den of zealous brain washers,”

“But–”

“But they hand out free bread, that’s exactly why you shouldn’t be so hesitant to rob people. Better to be on the wrong side of the law than the wrong side of history,” the one incharge chastised. His subordinate looked down at the icy cobbles in shame.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“The church of purity does try to help people,” the third man interjected, brave or stupid enough to choose now to butt in.

“That’s exactly what the Church of Light said,” the leaderman rebutted. There proceeded another silence, one of a more sombre sort.

The exchange had taken so long that I had forgotten my fear and had been running the rough fabric that made up the crude shirt (or so I believed it was called) through my fingers.

“It tickles!” I giggled as the scratchy fabric scintillated my nerves.

My outburst, unbeknownst to me, had softened the heart of the third man - the interjector and he said, “Perhaps we should leave him be.”

The second man seemed to gain some confidence at the third’s words as he looked up from the floor and at the ringleader with some hope.

Clock! A sound like two coconuts–

{Coconuts? What are they?

A large, round nut, filled with a white tasty flesh and water that gives you diarrhoea if you drink too much, my brain responded.

Thanks? I replied questionaly to myself before continuing the line of thought.}

–colliding resounded down the alley. I shifted my focus and saw that the two lesser ranked men within the criminal cabal had had their heads smashed together by their overlord. They didn’t seem hurt, just dazed.

“The mental ones are the best ones to rob from,” he hissed, anger fuming from between clenched teeth. Look at him, he’s going to die anyway. Better we have anything that’s on him than the corpse collector. Those shoes, they're worth a pretty penny,” he ended, calming slightly and pointing to my feet.

I looked down. They were rather nice. Shining black leather with a skull made from the punch hole perforations, on the perforated toe cap bout fleuri. I paused, wondering how I knew so many technical terms about shoes before another question struck me.

“What are shoes for?” I asked aloud. This caused the two dirty-work doers of the group to halt in their menacing advance and look back pleadingly at their boss, who only shooed them on.

Thinking of shoes, I managed to push myself up onto my arms as I watched the feet of the two men. They walked with bent knees and hands out to their sides as if they were trying to catch and eel but that’s not what caught my attention.

The white fluffy stuff was being marked by their passing. Footprints plodding along in the snow. Behind them, I saw something curious - another trail was being made in the wondrous winter water but I couldn’t make out a source. A slithering trail, about as thick across as my new arm, was winding its way down the alley from behind the three men.

“What's that?” I asked, pointing curiously. My brain did provide a response this time. The in-front-men looked about to look but their leader grasped both their heads and kept them pointing towards me.

“Nice try kid, but I wasn’t born yesterday.”

The three continued and stole my full attention. Just then, a group of kids, ranging from about 11 to 17, flooded into the alley from behind me.

They too were dressed in rags, about a dozen in all. To a one, they seemed to be malnourished and thin - only the size of their group and their weaponry made them a real threat to the three full grown and fully fed men. Speaking of weapons, they all carried ones of an improvised sort - mostly shives, crude wooden clubs, scrap metal, and the like.

They came between me and my attackers. The new group’s leader spoke first. He wore a brown flat cap.

“Doger, you’re not gonna rob anyone in the Street Kids’ teratory!” he said, fire in his words. His slight frame only slightly detracted from the image as he slapped a metal pipe against his open palm.

My eyes remained on the encroaching serpentine trail as it went between the seething leader’s feet. The tension grew between the two parties as they eyed each other up. My curiosity was overwhelming and, when the mysterious phenomena drew near, I held out a hand to hold the thing. Out of nowhere there appeared a snake and it bit onto my outstretched hand.

I screamed!