a poisonous transaction . ali

[k!ah]

M A R L O W E   C R O S S

The sky was dark, cloud heavy with rain that threatened to fall, moans above me.

I had not expected the weather to be so glum when I had originally planned the meeting. It made it messier. I had more factors to consider, to concentrate on. I didn't like things being messy. Simple was good. My feet don't make much sound as I race across the road before pressing myself against a building. I catch my breath, before daring to take a look around the corner, my eyes searching for any sign of movement. The district was under strict instructions to not be out and about after seven in the evening. But I had business to conduct and business couldn't care less that me running around the district could get my ass kicked, or worse thrown into some prison somewhere.

I wrap my coat tighter around my body, my fingers feeling for the sealed jar in my pocket. It was only a small jar, but its contents could be rather dangerous if exposed for too long. Satisfied that it was safe I continue my search. I scanned the the streets once again. There seemed to be no peacekeeper so I quickly cross to the next, keeping my head down until I was sure that I would be out of sight. I was good at sneaking around. In fact, on most occasions I would enjoy it. But the item that I was delivering was causing some unease. Mercury. I wasn't very educated on the substance, but I new that it had poisonous toxins and I preferred not to have it in my possession longer than I needed it to be. I was surprised at how difficult it was for me to get my fingers on it. In the past, something like this would have been quite simple to find. But with the current situation I had to dig deeper, get closer to asking for favours which I wasn't sure I would be able to re-pay.

I didn't want to have to put myself in that position.

Not again. Not after last time.

I was supposed to meet the client at ten tonight. When the district was asleep, when few eyes had the chance at spying them. The client had contacted me through a service on my computer. I knew very little about them, only that half the payment had already been transferred and the rest would be given up front, in person. I was uancharaterically nervous, about this transaction. I wasn't quite sure why, but my stomach was doing flips, my mind feeling a little jittery. I put it down to the fact that the peacekeeper presences had improved by a lot in the last few days, trying to convince myself that must be the reason why.

I had reached the confirmed location, and was know crouched down by the edge of the building. I take a peak at my watch: 9:57pm. Almost time.

[ali]

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Esther Carter

"Where is it?" she hisses, her voice starting lowly, then forgetting her place, grows into a shout. 

Ester pauses, a sudden dread washing over her as she glances to the bedroom door, ajar, light off. It was well beyond the time of the curfew, well past the time she had slipped into bed and pretended to be asleep, face buried beneath the covers because the only time she could stay remotely still was in her sleep. She had felt her mothers body beside hers, slipping in beside her, not half an hour ago. The sweet, sickly sting of the moonshine, lingering on her persons, meant that Esther did not wait long for her to fall asleep; she was a heavy sleeper her mother, because she always went to sleep with the dulcet tones of whiskey and home brewed wine. And still, Esther stared at the thin slither of darkness of the bedroom, jet black against the dim navy and orange light of the living room, like a deer caught in the headlights, waiting for the bedside lamp to be flicked on. 

When her mother did not stir, she let out a heavy breath, one she had not realised she had been holding. 

She shook the thought of her mother finding her from her mind. What she would say, if she found her in the dark searching for something? Probably nothing, a small voice told Esther as her hands scrambled in the dark for the front door key. Esther could not remember many things, her memory was like droplets of rain falling on the parched Earth. The Earth was always thirsty, so the earth would always drink her memories up. She could not remember what her mother might have said, but there was a small, broken peice of her mind that comforted her enough that she felt confident in searching the darkness for the front door key without being caught- though it was only the being caught part she felt confident about. Her heart fluttered inside her chest- she could barely remember what day it was, let alone where she put her house key. 

Glancing at the old, broken clock above the fireplace, Esther Carter longingly stared at the minute hand to stop, in hopes that time would still just long enough for her to find the key and reach the rendezvous on time. When it did not, she let out a frustrated hmph and grabbed her jacket she had left on the back of the dining room chair. 

-

Slipping through the window had been th easy part. She felt- though she could not exactly remember- that she had done it before. It felt tighter than what she, thought, had been used to, her hips growing and maturing wider. There was also a matter of her balance- where she thought she might have landed gracefully on the alleyway floor below,  tonight she found herself sprawling, tumbling back against the house next door. Her hands caught her, shakily. Somewhere- perhaps the house beside her, perhaps the one beyond that- a dog barked. Begging to the night to give way. For a second the girl froze, feeling her heart seizing in her chest, feeling all the colour drain from her face as her gaze flicked from one end of the alley way to the other. No one. Only her, the silence and the rain.

She did not let out a sigh of relief as she got to her feet and hurried off down the alley way and towards the canal.

Esther moved as quickly and quietly as she could, her gate gawky and jagged from years of mercury poisioning- the very thing she was seeking tonight. Her suppliers on the market had dried up, a week after the lock down went into place. She had asked every week, tears stinging her eyes as her small voice would trail off as they would shake their head- one of her sellers, a fellow hat maker, hadn't been seen in weeks. His stall empty, the door to his house shattered and splintered in two. Esther had tried not to cry when she saw it, the tell tale sign he was gone, but it was hard because she could not remember when she had seen this before. Broken door frames, smashed windows, the acidic taste of a flash grenade in the air. Wherever it was, it felt like a past life, a ghost. And she feared she would become just that- a ghost. Her mother barely worked, the terresae she had bought last year was half gone- half eaten and half spent on booze.  Esther had cried over this too- though she could not remember what it was like to be truly starving. 

Desperate, she had gone deeper. And there, she had found her seller. The one she was meeting tonight. 

All Esther could hear as she crept up the steps of the flood drain, her boots squelching beneath her bare toes as she tip toed up them, was her own shallow breathing. It was dark, there was no moon to light her way which she didn't know whether it was a blessing or a curse. Squinting in the dark, she thought she saw the outline of someone, crouching at the edge of the building. Esther raised her hand in greeting, her hand shaking as she held it up, before she ducked back down and ran back down the stairs and into the flood drain to hide, hoping they were a friend and that they were not foe. 

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