We reach a green wooden door, the entrance to an alleyway that connects to other hidden alleys-that’s basically the whole black market area. I pull out my keys and start fumbling with them while Vienna looks around to see if anyone notices us. “You sure this is the place?” she asks after a while of perfect silence. “You sure you wanna know the answer?” I respond, after finding the key. I shove the brass key into the door and open it, then turn to motion Vienna to follow me inside. The rain continues outside, but it’s blocked by the many drapes of water resistant fabrics above the alleys. Vienna closes the door behind us, and I’m thankful for that. She might be new to this, but at least she knows that we like to keep things private here for a reason. The entrance to the black market isn’t where most deals are made, that’s just common sense. We keep trash cans and bins along the walls to make it look “normal”, but it’s mainly our storage area. We keep food, weapons, drugs, clothes, pretty much anything in there, but the drugs and weapons are kept further down the end of the alley. When we reach the end, there’s a spot where it breaks off into three different alleys-four including the way we came in. Each alley is the same, built not too narrow for travel, but close enough to conceal each other. “Now what?” asks Vienna, breaking my train of thought. “You choose.” I say, turning back to her, “Either way will get us to his shop.” “Don’t screw with me-just show me where we’re going.” she growls. “Fine.” I say, backing off. I speed-walk towards the alley on my left, hearing the echoing footsteps of Vienna right behind me. The left side isn’t as crowded as the others, but less active as well. This is where food, medicine, and information is usually sold and traded. Unlike the other alleys, traders don’t carry as many weapons with them. The people here are still sleazy, but they don’t bargain as much as they used to. Drugs were basically giveaways, and food wasn’t as useful anymore. Information, however, was the main reason why this alley was still somewhat active. People who want to know things, like me, go here for information with a side of small food portions. Most of the time, they get information for a hefty price, but lucky ones like me get it for free. Ruther was the second to last stand at the far back of the alley, his shop was a small cut out from the brick building behind the alley. His stand was a dirty plastic fold out table containing aesthetic junk and small packets of rainbow powder of his own creation. “Skittle Dust” as he called it the last time I asked. It contained varieties of colorful elements, but it wasn’t just for those who wanted a good time. Skittle Dust was a deadly drug, its colorful outside masked the majority of arsenic on the inside. It was sold to drug marketers who had some trouble with their consumers, and decided they wanted to bump them off, but still give them the last taste of what they could have had if they hadn't been so agitating. I’d bought some before without thinking, and now it’s stuck in my back pocket untouched. When we reached the stand, Ruther got off his phone and jumped up from his chair behind the stand. “Damn! You’re still alive?” he chuckled. His annoying giant grin was growing even wider as he studied my accomplice. “New in town?” he asks. Vienna doesn’t answer, only continues to glare at me. Sighing, I turned back to Ruther and explained to him what we needed. Vienna pulls out the pic on her camera and the papers from her bag, then slides them on the table to Ruther. Ruther looks over the picture on the camera more than the papers, nodding his head a little while reading into it. I know the look on his face, he’s trying to decode the writing. He sets the camera and papers down on the table, turning to grab something from his bag underneath the piles of trash beside him. He pulls out a few things before grabbing a small vial of some sort of powder. He takes a few of the papers and starts sprinkling some of the power onto the paper. He takes a small makeup brush and moves the powder away. He pulls out his miniature black-light flashlight, tracing the indigo light along the paper. Fingerprints were now visible, and he pulled out his small camera and took a few photos of it. He pulls out the hard-drive and hands it to me with a small smile. After taking it, he says, “Well, it’s definitely his handwriting, and the fingerprints match…” We wait for him to say more, but nothing comes after that. Finally, Vienna prodded, “And? What else?” He laughs a little, scratching the back of his oily brown head. I lean in forward, gripping the edges of the table. “You can’t read this?” I ask with a strong irritant tone. “Well, it’s not like this is a common language.” he clarifies, “And who in their right mind would come to me with a make believe language to translate?” “Shit!” I yell, pushing away from the table. This causes it to almost tip over, but Ruther grabs onto it to hold it in place. I fully walk away from the stand and head straight towards the exit. “Hey! Wait up!” Ruther calls out, running towards me and Vienna-which I forgot she was right behind me. As I’m about to grab the collar of his fleece jacket, I hear something coming from the other alley. We all run towards the sound, and look to the alley that’s in between the left and the right. A gruff giant is tossing around this skinny guy like a sock-doll. The skinny guy tries to fight back, but he’s getting pummeled every time he gets up from the ground. “One of your customers, I suppose?” I ask, turning to Ruther. “Who? The guy getting his ass kicked?” He says, “Yeah, I recall him coming to my shop every once in a while.” “How did you know he was his customer?” asked Vienna, her inquizitive eyes meeting mine. “Skittle Dust is all over the other guy’s feet.” I explain, “My guess was that he used it to defend himself, and now he’s out of ideas to get away.” Ruther laughs a little before he says, “Much good that dust would do to him, that beast trying to kill him is the guy who sells guns and steroids.” I look back, just to see Vienna getting closer to the fight. I run towards her and grab her arm to pull her away. “What the hell are you doing?” I hissed. “We can’t let that guy die.” she says. “Why not? He screwed with the wrong people.” I corrected her. “Liv-look at him!” she says, pushing me forwards, “He can barely get up, he needs help!” I look at him, his black hair covers up most of his face from this angle but I can tell that his nose and lip is cut up and bleeding. He’s trying to crawl away, but the giant guy with the many scars on his biceps is dragging him backways by the leg. Without thinking, I’m walking towards this guy. Then I’m running. I ran right up to this giant, and yelled at him to look at me. He looks up at me after a while, his face full of rage as he yells, “What?!” I walk a bit closer, and with full thrust, lift my right leg high up from the ground until my boot connects with his nose. He staggers a little back, but doesn’t let go of the other guy’s leg. I thrust my other leg towards his chest, then ran forward and punched him in his exposed throat area. He lets go of the leg, and jumps towards me to crush me. I dodge his advances, and let him run right into the ground. He gets up quickly, and grunts a little as he staggers to stand tall. I walk forward, clenching my fists and itching to get rid of this guy. I guess I was scarier than I thought, because he eventually drops his fists and runs out to another alley. I turned around behind me to see if it wasn’t me who scared him away, but found nobody whose face turned to meet mine. I hear a staggering breath from below, and look down to see that the guy was on his knees now. Sighing, I kneel down and help him up onto his feet. When he’s up, he looks over at where the guy ran, then behind us. “Nobody else wants to kill you.” I appealed, “At least, nobody else who’s here.” “Thanks…” he mumbles, trying to move away from me and stand on his own. He looks younger than most of the guys I see here, usually they’re in their late twenties and forties. This guy must have come here for some action, I guess, as most young men do. Vienna walks towards us, and looks over at the guy who she had to ask me to save. “Is he okay?” she asks, and I roll my eye. “Yeah, he’s fine.” I say, “Just need to walk it off, I guess.” “I’m fine.” he grumbles, “You don’t need to worry about me. What’s done is done.” He staggers off, but something drops from his pocket and lands with a click-clack. He stops, and I drop down to pick up whatever was in his pocket just as I hear him hiss out a curse. The thing that he dropped was the hard drive of the finger prints, along with one of my keys. I pull away, giving the stuff to Vienna who’s behind me. The guy lunges for the hard drive and key, and I struggle to push him away. He starts yelling and scratching like a wild animal, each time reaching out to grab at Vienna. Eventually, Ruther goes over to help pull him away, and throws him onto the ground. I jump on him, and pull his arms behind his back and with my free hand press the side of his face onto the dirty cement floor. My knees are firmly on his legs, making sure that he doesn’t try to kick me off. He squirms for a bit, but gives up when I grab his hair and force it up, just to slam it back down. “You’re going to tell me exactly what you wanted with our drive and my keys!” I scowled. His breath is double time, but he manages to make out a few words. “Fuck. You. Bitch.” I slam his head against the floor again, this time with more force. “If you won’t comply, I’ll have Ruther kill you with that dust you bought from him.” I say. “What makes you think I’m scared of that shit?” he hisses, “It doesn’t even work.” “It doesn't work for people who are high on steroids as it is-ever thought of that?” I restated. He grumbles a bit, then laughs under his breath. “So you just want to know why I stole your drive and key?” he asks. “Oh-no, I wanted to know what the concrete floor tasted like.” I sassed. He tries to smirk, but it’s hard to when half of your face is being crushed against the floor. “I wanted to know why you’re looking for him.” he finally answers. “Who?” I ask. “Who do you think?” he retorts. “What is he talking about?” asks Vienna, “Does he know?” “No.” I say, my voice faltering a bit, “He couldn’t have…you we’re following us?!” I press his face deeper into the floor, and he begins to choke on air. He starts coughing a bit, so I let go of his head. After a few short breaths, he says, “I know how you can find him.” “It’s not how to find him that I’m looking for- it’s where that’s the answer I need.” I growled. “Where is kinda hard to find when you don’t have the right resources.” he smirks. “Then can you tell us where to find these resources?” I ask. “Only if you let me help,” he says. “Over my dead-” I start, but then stop myself when I realize what I was going to say didn’t make any sense. “Look. I’m smart enough to know your resources are real, but I’m not dumb enough to think you’re going to help us.” “If you say so.” He says, “But you don’t have to trust me, at least let me tell you the list of resources you’ll need, then both of us can go our separate ways to find him.” “Why are you looking for him?” I ask. “That’s none of your concern if you don’t want me to tag along with you and your buddy.” he responds. “Well too bad.” I say, lifting myself off of him. “You’re coming with us then.” “Wait-really?” asks Vienna, “Are you sure you really want to trust him?” “Hey, you made me rescue his sorry-ass, so don’t start backing down now that he’s joining us.” “Actually, it’s the other way around.” he corrects, and we both turn back to him. “I’m helping you find him, but I’m not the one who’s joining your team." He laughs a little under his breath, as he wipes away the dirt and blood off his face. "You’re joining us now.” he says with a smirk. Before I could ask why he changed his mind all of a sudden, I felt something prick the back of my neck and I fall to my knees. A gasp escapes my lips before I fully collapse onto the ground and black out.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.