Strang3 Coincidence



On the street level of Shanghai Sector, a young man like Gray Puppet didn’t belong. Neither did his ragtag team of gangsters, all of which were eighteen and orphans forever or never, depending on the day. Standing in the neon wash of colored lights, he wondered for a moment if this was really going to work.

There were four of them, enough to be a gang he supposed, and they looked up to him, because he was a genius. Maybe, they thought, he wasn’t smart enough to get off the streets, or he just didn’t care enough to, but Gray Puppet was a genius. They thought that, and he let them. This was his plan—a heist on a guy about to walk out of DanTech with a beefy suitcase wired to his arm. Gray Puppet didn’t know what was in it, but he knew it would be valuable, and he was a guy who got things that were valuable. Well, he and his unlikely team of throwaways. The four of them were dressed in the only outfits that they could pass for--cleaners. Besides, the outfits were comfortable, and allowed them to carry a little extra gear.

It was almost dinner, but the night sky was long dark—at least he supposed it was dark beyond the glow of city towers. Their target should be on deck soon, and Gray Puppet gave the wordless signal to his crew. Tiny, who was six feet and pure Hispanic muscle, was pretending to collect garbage out of sidewalk bins. Maybelline, his Turkish sometimes girlfriend, was waiting by the cleaning cart, shuffling and reshuffling the contents as if she were almost ready to start working. It was a challenge to hide her long purple hair, but she refused to cut it. A wig and hat worked if you didn’t look too closely at her. And Kentucky bred Matchbox was waiting, head to toe in a business suit, with a beefy fake suitcase wired to his arm. He was called Matchbox because he was always ready to ignite. They all had better names than Gray Puppet, which came from a fortune cookie, but it stuck and that was it.

The black doors slide open, smooth as water, and Mr. Unlucky comes walking out in his bullshit long coat, briefcase in hand. Gray Puppet knew their security and their security protocols; the courier was monitored, alarms went off if he didn’t make it to his car, and the inside of the building was a fortress in disguise. They kept a low profile but DanTech was no-nonsense about its security; the whole building was rigged with TX1 gas. They weren't the type to suffer a hostage situation or an infiltration--they’d just knock you out and clean you up later.

One. Tiny is walking. Maybelline is on the move as well.

Two. He sees Matchbox heading towards Mr. Unlucky, as if he intends to enter DanTech himself.

Three. Gray smiles--Matchbox and their target look pretty damn identical from here. The walk from DanTech to the hovercar garage is in plain sight, which is ironically the least secure and least monitored place to take the guy. And whoever he is, he’s someone important. Maybe even a developer, but certainly not just a courier. The courier services quit by 5:00 pm at DanTech, but this guy always leaves an hour later. Gray Puppet figured he was somebody. Stuff like that was why his crew called him a genius, but really it just made sense.

Four. Tiny and Maybelline are coming. Matchbox walks so close to the guy that they touch, and a torrent of electricity stumbles Mr. Unlucky. Matchbox is now walking the other way—the direction Mr. Unlucky was going half a second earlier. If you blinked you didn't see it. Mr. Unlucky is helped by Tiny and Maybelline all the way into the trash cart, and Maybelline covers him smoothly with a few garbage bags. They slowly--though Gray wishes they could run--walk back to the pickup point where Gray Puppet is waiting. It took two seconds. Obviously Mr. Unlucky isn’t going to make it to the car, so in about two minutes DanTech security will know there’s a problem. The crew will all be gone twenty seconds before that happens. Gray switches the fuel cell engine on and waits for the team. This old four wheel van doesn’t hover, but he doesn’t need it to. In a moment the back door slides open, then Tiny and Maybelline load their hostage/paycheck. For just a small moment, Gray gets the feeling that this was a little too easy.

“Damn, he hit something hard falling in the waste bin,” Tiny laughed.

“He won’t feel it til’ he wakes up. Matchbox zapped him good,” Maybelline said, ripping off her wig and hat.

“Wait until we are clear,” Gray tried to say, but Maybelline told him to screw off with a look.

Tiny and Maybelline sat on either side of the waste bin, looking at Mr. Unlucky’s fine shoes poking out morbidly. The van sped through an alley, cutting through a parking garage, and then down another alley. It was a route Gray had memorized and practiced for tonight. There were half a dozen spots that ensured he couldn’t be tailed, and any Shanghai Sector cameras that followed him would lose him a dozen times in the process. They finally parked outside an apartment building with an overly dark street level and parking garage. The van doors slid open and they rolled the garbage cart to the elevator, leaving it by the other dumpsters and dragging the man the rest of the way. If someone saw any of this, they wouldn’t say anything. That was the kind of city this was. The elevator carried them up to the fourth floor, to a building that he just happened to find was vacant after hacking a real estate database. He and his team had really enjoyed squatting here for the last three days. When the doors to the studio opened, four floors later, Matchbox was already waiting inside.

“Took you fuckers long enough. Let’s rip that bitch off his arm and see what we got,” he said. Impulsive, impatient, predictably unpredictable. Gray had to handle Matchbox carefully, or he just might rip Mr. Unlucky’s arm off.

“We don’t want to risk the failsafe. We need his passcode to the briefcase, that’s why we brought him here, instead of just a cut and run,” Gray Puppet reminded him. He supposed it wasn’t really a reminder, since Matchbox hadn’t actually heard him the first time, but whatever. Tiny and Maybelline dragged him to a chair, and he was starting to finally wake up from all of the shuffling. They set him in front of a table and placed the briefcase next to him. Gray Puppet watched his hostage as Mr. Unlucky started to wake up. He blinked his eyes, slowly looked around, and never once showed fear or surprise. That actually worried Gray Puppet a little.

“Wake up asshole,” Matchbox said with an unfriendly slap on Mr. Unlucky’s shoulder. He jolted. Matchbox was holding a knife, the point of it brought uncomfortably close to Mr. Unlucky’s blue eyes. “Open this bitch,” Matchbox said and then bumped the table with his knee, jostling the briefcase. The case had a classic numerical number dial on the outside, but Gray wouldn’t take any chances on a dummy trigger, even this early on. Mr. Unlucky looked at Matchbox, face blank. Then he looked across the room at Tiny, Maybelline, and finally at Gray Puppet. He made eyes with Gray and wouldn’t take them off.

“I’m only dealing with him,” their hostage finally said. Still no fear in his eyes.

“Hey!” Matchbox thrust the knife to his neck. Luckily, it was Maybelline who stepped in.

“Let’s cool it, Rusty,” she said. She was the only one who called him Rusty, and only when it was serious. Gray Puppet knew it was Matchbox's real name; he also knew never to call him by it. Maybelline was closer to Matchbox--it was that and a billion other nuances that became rules to live by in a group like this. Matchbox leaned in to Mr. Unlucky.

“I got no problem spilling red all over your ugly suit, just give me a fucking reason,” he whispered.

“I’m only dealing with him,” the stranger said, still looking at Gray. Tiny and Maybelline looked at Gray, urging him to step in before Matchbox made use of that knife. Gray Puppet didn’t want to yet; something had changed. This stranger wasn’t afraid, and he should be. Gray Puppet smelled a problem, but he couldn’t see what it was, try as he might. Maybe it was just paranoia. So the guy wasn’t scared. He was still their hostage, they were still in control. Gray walked up to the table.

“Open it,” Gray said flatly. The man looked at Gray.

“You open it. The numbers are 12-02,” Mr. Unlucky said.

Gray’s face didn’t change. 12-02? He spun the briefcase to him, still cybernetically linked to the man’s arm. He rolled the dials on both sides to 12-02, which coincidentally was the month and day of his birthday. The case opened and revealed a computer, tucked neatly inside a shell thick enough to be dropped from the top of the building without breaking. The screen and keyboard were integrated into the frame. Gray's shoulders slouched a bit. He was hoping for something a little simpler, like a removable media drive, or a functional prototype, something he could just put in his pocket and sell. Well, whatever they were stealing now was a file inside the computer, obviously, some kind of company secret or the like. Given everything thus far, it was still worth a lot of credits, still worth the effort, just not as easy as he was hoping for. Weird, about his birthday though… The monitor illuminated, prompting a password. “Give me the password,” Gray said, studying the stranger.

The stranger never changed his expression. “Very well. D, 1, s, s, 0, n, 4, n, t, L, 1, f, 3.”

Gray had stopped typing the password by the second ‘s’. His face went cold, and this time he knew he gave away his expression. He looked up at the man, his hostage, whose expression still had not shown any fear. Gray took a step away from the laptop and looked to the side, trying to piece this together. Something was out of place, but he wasn't seeing the total picture yet. Gray looked back at the man. Was this some coincidence or what?

“Gray!” Maybelline shook him.

“Yeah.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Hm?” he said, stalling. He looked around, having everyone’s interest on him. Tiny and Matchbox knew something was up.

“What is it?” Tiny chimed, but he ignored him.

“Nothing.”

Gray Puppet sat back down at the laptop and typed in the password, a password he already knew, since it was the password he used for his digital safe deposit box. D1ss0n4ntL1f3, it was Gray Puppet’s password. How did this man know it? Did he somehow... what? Get himself kidnapped? To do what?! Gray Puppet was walking into a trap, or was already in a trap, but he didn’t know what to do. Trapped by Mr. Unlucky, and trapped by his team. If they knew, they’d all flip out and kill the man, and then run. Maybe that’s what they should do, flip out, kill this guy, and run. Gray wasn’t much for killing anyone, but Matchbox wouldn’t hesitate. His hands were unsteady, so he buried them under the table after typing in the password. His mind was racing for what to do, and in that race he thought, just for a second, it could all be coincidence. A wishful thought, to be certain.

“Oh fuck,” they said in unison, with variations of intensity and expression. Matchbox took one look at the monitor and started pacing like a wild dog. Tiny and Maybelline stared, frozen, as they observed the desktop picture on the laptop. They were staring at themselves, a desktop picture of the four of them.

“What the fuck is this??” Tiny said, hands to his head in shock.

“Hey! Hey!! Are you fucking with us?!” Matchbox grabbed the man by the hair and twisted his head, bringing a gun to his ear. The man looked up at the ceiling, waiting for Matchbox to discontinue, never once pleading for his life.

“Matchbox!” Gray yelled. He had to yell twice to get his attention.

“What, Gray?!”

“Think! Kill him and run, hope they don’t find us?? Or we find out what they want, since they know more than us,” Gray said. He didn’t have any clue what that was, or how any of this was happening, but since they were breathing, it had to be something; a job, a task, steal something for them, something. Somehow, DanTech lured Gray Puppet and his team into robbing them, they planned all of this… Gray was still trying to figure out how.

BLAM!

The stranger’s neck went limp, brain and skull bits danced and splattered on the floor. Matchbox had pulled the trigger when his gun was to the side of Mr. Very Unlucky’s temple. Maybelline and Tiny started yelling, while Matchbox unloaded justifications and votes to run. Gray felt the threads of this situation slipping from his hands and tightening around his neck. Then the lights went out.

It came with a sound, like a descending whooom, as power stopped flowing through the walls and lights. For a moment, it was beautifully quiet.

“Now you’ve done it!” Tiny yelled at Matchbox, breaking the solace.

“He had our picture! Let’s get out of here,” Matchbox yelled.

“Gray?! Gray!! Are we fucked, Gray?!” Maybelline cried. Finally his crew looked at him.

His face was visible in the glow of the laptop, which was the only source of light now. He looked around at the dark studio, their faces glowing too. “Yes, we’re fucked, unless we follow this. Whatever they want, we get it for them, and then hope they let us go. They are ready for anything we do. They are out there, waiting, Matchbox, that should be obvious by now. It’s suicide trying to run,” he said. He didn’t know if that was true, but it probably was, and if he sensationalized it a bit, it might be enough to keep control of Matchbox. He needed time to figure out what all of this was about. He didn’t know, but whatever the stakes were before, the dead stranger just raised them. Gray stood up and walked around to his lifeless hostage. He tried to avoid bloody bits as he checked the man’s coat. No ID in his pockets, just a pack of gum and a few loose credits. Gray Puppet undocked the cybernetic cable from the man and, after a moment of reconsideration, connected it to his own port, a universal one that Gray had placed at the base of his skull. The latency on cybernetic connections, especially for hackers, was microscopically faster at the base of the skull than any other body port. And then something dawned on Gray. “Maybelline,” he said before initiating the neural connection. She came closer.

“You sure we’re doing this?” she asked.

“There's no choice. Listen,” he leaned in close to her, whispering in her ear, so inaudible that a microphone couldn’t detect him talking. When he was done she looked him in the eye with a questioning nod, and then she went to the others, whispering to them too. Then, when everyone was ready, Gray initiated the cybernetic port. His mind was now interfacing directly to the CPU on this briefcase.

He was inside. He missed being inside.

He was standing in pure black, though he himself was completely lit. A glowing green door appeared, and words echoed through his mind, words sent from the program he was connected to. He heard instructions. “This is a memory program. By entering the green door, you are consciously allowing us the necessary access. You will do what we tell you to do, when we tell you to, or as a failsafe, we will wipe your mind clean.”

Gray wondered why the computer said ‘we’. It sounded like the programmer was trying to be intimidating, a sense of superiority or some bullshit. And, while it may disappoint said programmer, the overall threat wasn’t too scary. Having his memory wiped wasn’t that bad, if it came to that. His life was shit so far, but, at the same time, he’d avoid a brain sweep just the same. Gray Puppet walked along the black void and into the green door, which he disappeared into. He really missed being inside.

Suddenly he was inside a room. He was staring at a red, plastic telephone, and there was a voice. A soft, precious, familiar voice. It was his father. Gray Puppet had no recollection of his father, all he had were blurry images that came briefly through dreams. But looking around, he knew this place. He remembered that this was his home. He looked down and saw that he was wearing a diaper. What the fuck was this?

“Look at the table, Gray,” the computer said. He went backwards through his thoughts, rewinding to a bouncy toy that he disgustingly had in his mouth after rubbing the dog with it. Gray could taste everything, a passenger in his own thoughts, with no control over his actions. Memories from infancy. These were things that already happened, he was just reliving them. This kind of tech wasn’t supposed to exist.

“I see the table,” Gray thought, which communicated perfectly to the software accessing his mind.

“I need you to see what’s on the table.”

Gray went forward with his thoughts. This was too surreal, watching his father. They wanted him to see what was on the table, something from when he was just a toddler, but each time his eyes went to his dad. Then Gray started to shake and he didn’t know why. But his subconscious knew why.

“Relax, Gray, this happened a long time ago, you survive unharmed,” the program said. Then a window shatters and he tenses up, about to cry. The toddler was crying, not him, but he had the emotions in his head. His dad was on the floor. There were a lot of big guys in the room, looking for something. The papers that were on the table had been tossed to the floor.

“Do you see the papers?” the voice said.

“Fuck you!” Gray shouted. “Let me out of here!”

“Not until we have what we want. I don’t ever have to let you go, Gray. If you want out of here quickly, then relax, and think about those papers,” the voice said. “You’re only useful if you saw those papers.”

Gray’s heart was pounding, and it wasn't just the memory taking place. He was crying, afraid of the big men, and wanting his daddy to get up. He picked up a ball, wanting something comfortable. The men left. In his adult mind, Gray knew what they had done, and now they had set the place on fire too. They were fast, efficient, and organized, so his dad must have been into something bad. Whatever it was got him killed. They left. Now Gray crawled over to his daddy, afraid to walk on his wobbly feet. Gray knows he’s dead--blood is coming out of his skull--but the toddler doesn't know. The toddler in him just doesn’t get it. Fuck this computer for making him remember this!! There’s a reason he didn’t remember any of this, his mind had locked it out, forever. Fuck! Gray crawled over the papers.

“Go back, Gray.”

The scene froze and went in reverse, slowly, until he looked down at the papers. It was a map. A spot was circled on the map.

“End sequence,” the voice said, and then Gray was swirling. His mind was viciously disconnected from the cybernetic port, something that left him feeling like a crowbar hit him in the head. He fell from the chair and felt Maybelline’s hands holding him up. He opened his eyes to the swirling dark room, and saw Tiny holding a flashlight. Gray knew this was the present, the now. He was back with his crew in the dark studio. He wasn’t a toddler anymore, he was himself again. What a fucking trip. He saw his dad die… shit. He had just been a little kid again, freaking horrible. Then came the sound he knew was imminent. The bastards who did this were going to finish it now that they had Gray's memory.

When the pop burst, Gray's ears were ringing even though he was covering them. Gas filled the studio from the loosed canisters that were fired inside. Gray and Maybelline struggled some before falling over, facing each other, collapsing eye to eye. He saw the flashlights fall as Matchbox and Tiny hit the deck too, after a glorious attempt to stay on their feet.

A minute passed.

Footsteps. Someone was retrieving the laptop. Yeah, Gray Puppet didn’t think they’d want to broadcast whatever they found over the Networks, which were hacked and monitored and re-hacked a trillion times a day. The location on that map held something his dad must have been working on, and they had been searching all this time. Somehow they found Gray, taking a bet that he had seen something. The computer honed in on the memories, narrowed them down. Now someone was taking the laptop off the table. The mysterious figure stopped near the dead man, and looked at Gray and his crew on the floor. Then he accessed his communicator. “Keep gassing the place. Punks killed Whitman, let em’ die,” he said. Maybelline growled a little.

As soon as the studio doors opened and closed, the crew stood up. Gray gave the signal and they headed to the stairs. When it was safe, they took out the mouthpieces.

“How did you know they’d gas us?” Tiny asked.

“Cause’ he’s a damn genius, aint’ I been saying it?” Maybelline said. Gray didn’t know they’d gas him, but he had studied DanTech security systems. Whoever their Chief of Security was, he liked to keep his responses low key and overwhelming, hence the building’s gas response. It was a blitz psych profile Gray composed only minutes ago, one that paid off when he had whispered to the crew to get those mouthpieces. Gray had a knack for payoffs. Now to get that computer back.

“Okay, let’s all get the fuck out of here now,” Matchbox urged. “Shit! I got blood on my shirt man,” he said, looking at the splatter from shooting Mr. Very Unlucky in the head. It seems the fear of death and subsequent escape of mentioned death had made them all forget that Gray Puppet had just cybernetically docked with a stolen, high tech computer, and nobody was asking what he saw.

“Yeah, but let’s torch the place first. Matchbox, they’ll come looking for us, torch it good. Something high incendiary, make it plausible that our bodies were disintegrated,” Gray said.

“I don’t have my gear,” Matchbox said.

“Make it work!” Gray snapped. He rarely, make that never, snapped. So when he did, Matchbox nodded.

“Yeah, I’ll make it work, they have gas lines in the walls, I’ll rig some shit, toast the studio, but as long as the fire department doesn’t take the day off, it won’t burn the other floors. I got this,” Matchbox said, his eyes scanning back and forth in self thought. “Gray, what was on the computer?”

Gray Puppet answered after a slight pause. “Nothing. Something in my head, but I don’t know what. Something from my childhood, but… it didn’t make sense.” Gray gave a dramatic pause at the end to make it look a little more convincing. Maybelline was watching him, and she was not convinced. She knew him too well. Tiny and Matchbox seemed to buy it though. They opened the door to the stairwell joining all floors.

“Nothing huh?” Maybelline said.

“Well, nothing I could understand, it was some weird neural shit,” Gray said.

Maybelline looked at him closer before deciding. “Matchbox, he’s lying to us,” she finally said. Matchbox didn't need to be told twice; he slammed Gray into the wall with his forearm. Gray clutched at Matchbox’s hand as he was then pushed against the railing of the stairs, the ground being four floors down.

“You're gonna' take a dive, Gray!” Matchbox threatened him. Gray knew he would do it too. “What was on the computer?!”

“Alright!” Gray said, hands out for fear of falling.

“Just tell him, Gray!” Tiny cried, half afraid that Matchbox was going to send him down the stairs the fast and final way.

“It’s an account number, from the file job we did! They knew I saw the data sheets, they memory mapped me to get it!

“We sold those!!” Matchbox yelled, pushing Gray almost over the railing.

“Not that one!! It was a transfer account, it encrypted the moment we copied it!!” Gray said, his hands slipping from the railing as Matchbox threatened to drop him over the side.

“How much is it worth?” Maybelline said.

“A lot,” Gray answered, panting.

“What do we do, Maybelline?” Matchbox asked with his face right against Gray's.

“Matchbox, you torch the studio, me and Tiny will get the laptop back,” Maybelline said. “Gray was right about them coming after us, so we need to be dead,” she added.

“I want to push him down the stairs!” Matchbox said.

“So do it already,” Maybelline said. Gray braced himself for what came next.

He felt gravity flip as Matchbox spun him over the railing, and he reached out with desperate hands but didn’t catch anything. His shoulder clipped the bar on the third floor that sent him tumbling. He tried to stabilize himself and brace for impact as air rushed past him, but it all happened much faster than he thought it would. He didn’t even have a chance to scream, his body too paralyzed, as he landed on the floor.

Gray Puppet was breathing. That was good. The wind was knocked out of him, and bad, so he wasn’t necessarily acting when he didn’t get up. His shoulder might be out of socket, it hurt like a bitch. But it worked. Matchbox had tossed him, just like Gray wanted him to.

When the plan changed, when he knew he had to betray his ragtag crew, he lied on purpose. He lied because he knew Maybelline would catch it. And when she did, he knew Matchbox would kill him. That's why he took the stairs in the first place. Gray Puppet was called a genius by these guys because he had a knack for anticipating things. He didn't anticipate having to do this, but he knew that someday things might go really, really bad. So for the last four jobs, he had escape routes. Never expected to use any of them, never wanted to for certain, but they were his life insurance policy. He always had an escape plan. This plan involved the polyfoam floor Gray Puppet had installed here. He knew his team, knew how to position them to the stairwell, and knew how to exploit Matchbox, all while making it look like he wasn't in control. The polyfoam had saved his life. It was four inches thick and designed for extreme impact absorption. He painted it to match the concrete floor. No one would know unless they tried to bounce a ball on it. It was one of three deaths that he had rigged in this building; the stairwell, his own gun filled with blanks, and a heat blanket under the couch. Though, truly, he didn't anticipate DanTech being on to him from the start. That's when the plan changed. That's when he had to get himself killed.

If he had to admit it, Gray Puppet really was a genius. And he knew he traveled and robbed with a band of criminals, one of them a very hotheaded and psychopathic Matchbox. If he ever had to turn on his own team, Matchbox would kill him. So the trick was to get killed in a way he could prepare for. He might get trapped in the studio while Matchbox torched everything, which was what he first thought would happen, and where the heat blanket and oxygen mask would have saved him. Or if things got too tense too early, Gray would pull his gun out and Matchbox would take it, beat him with it, and then shoot him with red paint blanks. It would sting, but Gray would live. And finally, the stairway. Matchbox used killing as an extension of his rage, and hurling someone off the top of the stairs was something the psycho probably thought of every time he climbed them. So by lining the bottom floor with a high absorption weight dispersing foam, he could survive a fall as long as he didn’t land on his head. Getting it to fit under the doorway and not be noticeable wasn’t easy, he had to shave an inch off the bottom of the door, but the concrete paint really made it blend in perfectly. He was hoping he’d never have to use it, but hope doesn't keep you alive, not in this city.

He lied in a way that sounded convincing, but not so convincing that Maybelline wouldn't catch it. That would make the team think that Gray was holding out on them, holding out on a big score or something. He knew not to tell the lie he wanted them to believe until he was staring four stories down at what the others thought was a concrete death bed. Then they'd buy whatever he said as the truth; which was the lie he wanted them to buy. Not the first lie. The second lie. Now he knew Matchbox was about to torch the place, and Maybelline and Tiny were going to attack Mr. Laptop Stealer. If they lived or died trying to rob him, they’d never make use of anything they found on that laptop. That just left Matchbox.

Gray Puppet stood up, very slowly, very carefully. His body ached, and would for days as the outline of his impact slowly melted from the polyfoam. His left shoulder didn’t feel right, so he let his arm dangle as he opened the street level door. He looked up and down the alleyway and saw a dumpster diver, nobody else. This alleyway was always too dark, which was why he picked it. He stepped out and headed towards the glowing neon signs across the street. They were Chinese symbols for a noodle shop, Lucky Horse or something . They were a block from Shanghai Sector’s food district, which was a very nice treat for late night munchies. Gray Puppet heard three gunshots.

It could be random--lots of crime in this Sector--or it could be Tiny and Maybelline, or it could be Mr. Laptop Stealer defending himself. Gray removed his palmPad from an inside pocket, but it was smashed. He was eager to load a map, get a look at what he saw in that computer. Another shot rang out. Good. That meant someone had fired back. They were probably all dead. That gave him time. He needed time to find what his dad was working on, what he had died for. And whatever it was, Gray Puppet was going to find it. It must be valuable, but that didn’t matter. It was something of his dad’s. He had nothing else of him. He didn't even know what he looked like until today.

Gray wouldn’t be forgetting those memories anytime soon, but he did need to get scarce. His body was neon orange from the glowing street signs above him as he entered the noodle shop. The smell of seared chicken and ginger hit him. He grabbed a seat at the bar and sipped the cup of water that was promptly served. So, what was happening to Matchbox right now? Gray smiled. This part really was genius, no denying it. The crew didn’t know it, but the doors to the studio were electronically locked unless Gray was with them. He didn't want anyone--crew included--snooping around. They always came together, they always left together, and the RFID signal from Gray Puppet’s palmPad was the silent signal that unlocked the doors. So if he wasn’t within fifty meters, or if his palmPad took a four story dive, the doors were locked. So right now, as Matchbox was torching the studio, he was probably yanking on the doors for dear life, wondering why they wouldn’t open, as the rest of him went up in flames.

“I’m ready to order,” Gray said. Nan Li, his friend and noodle shop waiter, came to take his order.

“Hi Gray, hungry tonight?”

“I need the Travelling Buddha,” Gray said. Nan Li looked at him, as if a second look was part of the protocol.

With a nod and a quick look around, he finally spoke. “Coming up.” Nan Li reached under the counter and shuffled several cups and napkins around before retrieving a wrapped book. It was a package Gray Puppet kept here in case he needed to make a hasty exit. It had identification, travel tickets, and enough money to get him out of town in style. He took the package and placed it under his arm. “How about a takeout?” Nan Li asked, getting some Singapore Prawns and rice from the counter and putting them into a box. He threw it in a plastic bag and added chopsticks. “Take care, Gray,” Nan Li said. They both knew it was goodbye.

“Thanks Nan, for everything,” Gray Puppet said. This was good, saying goodbye to somebody, and he was getting hungry too. He grabbed the package and the takeout with his good arm and went outside just as something smashed in the air above. All eyes looked up as a shower of glass came down, followed by a ball of flame hurling from the fourth floor. It was so big and loud that you almost couldn’t see Matchbox’s body inside the ball of fire. Gray Puppet hoped Matchbox saw him before dying so he could ask himself, “...is that Gray?”

Yep. It’s me, Gray Puppet. And if his crew had taken a second to think about it, they would have called him Puppet Master instead. The glowing city lights welcomed him as he walked to the subway station four blocks later, to the symphony of sirens.

Time to find out what dad was working on. Time to start a new chapter in Gray Puppet's life. To be honest, he was looking forward to it.

If you enjoyed reading this, you might enjoy my books as well.
Paphos 1
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