Chapter 6

Shade

April

He sat in the grass, in the park, in the middle of the city. It was such a strange place. He had never seen anything like it. Extraordinary. So many people, all oblivious, wandering around without knowledge, and therefore, without fear. A fearless world. Amazing.

To be fair, this planet stood apparently devoid of any evil overlords or armies of darkness. No impending doom. No monstrous demons. Not until recently.

Shade smiled, and his smile was such that passersby, who already were giving him a second glance, began to walk a little faster and more purposefully when they saw it.

He wore a fine suit, black and charcoal grey. He had the pocket square; he had the tie clip; he had the pocket-watch on a golden chain. He wore an expensive pair of sunglasses with the left lens missing, like a bizarre eyepatch. He leaned back easily on a wooden bench in Millennium Park, Chicago, basking in the sunlight and grinning at the ignorant throngs.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Two months. He never ceased marveling at how strange this whole place was, how strange its people were. What they thought, what they didn’t think. The interstices were all tangled. Figments running around. Exiles like himself, far from home. Seven billion humans? And nothing else? Not very interesting.

There were museums in this big city. Shade had arrived only the day before, but he had already visited most of them. None of them turned out to be important. Disappointing. He had just finished with the one called the Art Institute. It had—what? A bunch of pictures? Shaped stone? Not even very many doors.

Now, this Internet, on the other hand—that was where things were happening. That was where he found the good stuff. That was where all the data was hiding. Shade had spent two months sifting through it. He had got most of the important details by now. He knew what had happened; he knew what was happening; he had a pretty good idea of what was about to happen. And he, Shade, was in a position to make sure it never happened again. Finally, an end.

All he had to do was kill someone.