Month: April 2022

Chapter 3 of Under A Killing Moon

<- Digging Down|

The Second Dream

Nighttime. The streets are cracked and grey and crumbling, snow and ash and black sand cling like tar to your bare feet. Each icy breath fills your nose with the tang of fresh blood and the sour-sweet stink of spoiled meat. Something his hiding behind the soot black sky, beyond the twisted tendrils that once were buildings. So large and so distant that the fire motes suggest only a presence. A shapeless immensity, nothing more. And above it all, the moom hangs huge, rivers of quicksilver blood spilling from raw wounds unsettling similar to the shape of Jacob’s body, falling onto the world like rain…

Waking

Jerome woke uneasily, still caught on what happened to Jacob, the body moving, the ruin of it. It gnawed at him, as did the effects of his kick being so crippling. That should not have been possible, he just wanted to sweep Jacob’s legs out from under him. He buried himself in work for a time, heading to Freddy’s shop to help out some more, but ti was hard to keep focus. His mind kept drifting and he took advantage of Freddy’s internet to do some research via web search. That wasn’t much help, with searches like “white fluid moon” and “bloody moon” producing results that were wither unpleasantly sexual or weird and feminazi-ish.

Out on the cold streets, Anabell rolled off a bench sometime in the morning. The dream and the pain from her arm made sleep elusive and not long after dawn she just gave up on it entirely. There was a free clinic on Harris St. that ran on Sundays. She headed that way, preparing for a long wait and a load of probing questions. She wasn’t disappointed, but after a few hours of work and a few minutes of care she was bandaged and pretty sure she wasn’t infected with anything serious. At a loss of what to do and wanting to figure out what the hell had happened to Jacob, she went looking for the only one of the people she had shared the experience last night that she had even a basic lead on – Ethan. Perhaps if she stalked the hospital, she could catch him there.

Dr Clarke was not at Felicity Memorial. He was at home in his apartment, enjoying a day off. He still woke in his apartment, refusing to break routine for little things like relaxation or sleep. He spent the day trying not to think on the dream or the events of the previous night, focussing on reading an article in the Hournal of Emergency Medicine as Frazier played in the background to fill the silence. It didn’t work. Something was wrong. He tapped at his pockets, checking each in turn. Something was missing. His torch. He tried to ignore the absence, it was likely at Felicity Memorial, accidentally left when he was getting treatment last night. He could get it tomorrow at work. He should wait until then. He couldn’t wait. The absence was bothersome. So he headed to the hospital to check and get everything back into its proper place.

Anabell had not been loitering at the hospital long enough for security to notice her when Ethan arrived. She intercepted him on the footpath between the staff carpark and the main building, just in time for someone to notice. Worse, it was Keith Arcand, one of the surgeons that Ethan had developed a rivalry with for reasons neither of them really remembered. After a few choice words about Ethan’s interesting choice of company, Dr Arkham headed into the building with a smile that would last most of the day while Ethan and Anabell headed to Ethan’s car to talk about in private about the previous night.

Despite Anabell’s insistence that something strange had happened, Ethan remained resolutely disbelieving. He blamed poor light, gas leaks and folie à deux … “technically folie à quatre as there were four of us”… and would not be shaken, dragging up chunks of medical knowledge to convince himself as much as Anabell. Exasperated, Anabell decided another look in daylight was needed and left for a walk to the abandoned goodwill shop. Ethan gave her is cell number, not quite catching the sarcasm she thanked him with.

Searching

Elsewhere in Merritt, Michael woke late, though not much later than usual. As the fog of sleep faded, he noticed that his hands were sparkling in the streams of cold winter sunlight creeping though tears in the old curtains. Blood. Dried blood and spray paint and shards of glass embedded in his skin. He stumbled to the bathroom to clean off, only then realising that he was still wearing clothes equally spattered in blood and paint and glass. He started to come back to himself as he washed, the chill of the water helping shake off the last of sleep. Something felt skewed inside him. A chain had slipped deep inside. He had done something horrible, the worst thing he had ever done in his life, and yet part of him was glad. He let himself get lost in the mindless act of cleaning himself up, put bandaids on the worst of the glass cuts and headed out. He needed to see the pace where they had been before…

The shop. It was more obviously derelict in the daylight. Other stores along the street were open and busy; as a backstreet could be. The goodwill was closed, rollerblinds down and covered, exposing a riot of grafitti and rust with the image of a huge woodpecker with a stylised DMZ along the side of its beak at the centre of it all. Michael didn’t even look at it, just walked casually by. A patrol car was parked opposite the entrance to the alleyway, one cop inside who was more interested in a magazine than watching the street. Michael slipped into the alleyway from the other end and sneaked round to the door to the goodwill. The door was still open, the dark maw of the door covered with bright bands of police tape. He ignored them, slipping carefully past them and inside.

Things inside looked emptier in the greasy daylight filtering through the dingy skylight. Without the concealement of darkness, the spaces where things should have been were much more noticable. Spaces where stock and fittings had been. A gap on a desk where a computer might have been. Ragged clothing, broken crockery and the ugliest ornaments were all that remained. Michael ignored the room and headed down to the basement. Everything seemed normal with the daylight filtering down the stairs, aside from the forensic marks scattered around the floor and the copper stains of blood on a series of pins protruding from the wall, supports for some kind of shelving now long gone. Crack. Michael froze. Someone was moving upstairs. He dove for cover among the sacks and shadows that had served so well the night before.

Upstairs, Anabell was creeping into the building, taking advantage of the cop in the patrol car being distracted talking to someone on the street. Lucky break. There was just enough time for her to get down into the basement and for she and Michael to notice each other when footsteps started above. Someone was coming who cared a lot less about about being as subtle or sneaky as either of them…

Ethan marched down the stairs. He had been the one talking to the cop, convincing him to let him take a quick look inside the shop for the torch he had lost. It was against protocol, letting someone into an active crime scene without escort, but it was cold out there and Officer Baker knew Dr. Clarke from crossing paths at the ER. He was a bit of a cold fish but always professional. Baker figured he could trust him just this once…

In the basement, the three finally exchanged names and Ethan earned a dirty look from Anabell. If he was coming here, why hadn’t he said or saved her from a long walk in the cold. No explanation, just a cold shrug. Each following their own interests, the turned their attentions to the wall, the pipes, the supporting pins, the floor. Keen eyes and Michael’s engineering knowhow revealed nothing to suggest the wall was false. No seams, no mechanisms, no hollowness. No gas in the pipes either, Anabell pointed out sharply. If there was a void behind the wall, it was on the other side of solid brickwork.

Seeing

Elsewhere, Jerome had grown completely unable to focus on his work. He apologised to Freddy, who was understanding and let him finish early. Jerome was such a good lad and a hard worker. Everyone had off days. Jerome headed to Chakrii’s to try and work out his aggression on a bag and see if he could figure out what had happened with that kick. He worked through multiple routines, growing increasingly aggressive with each until a volley of brutal strikes finally tore through the fabric of the bag, spilling sand from the wound. The few other gymgoers watched this with surprise at the sudden anger from mousy little Jerome; none of them caught the gold flash in his eyes.

Back in the basement, Anabell was rifling through the carpet edges for something that could be a hinge while Michael and Ethan studied the wall. Michael noticed something from the corner of his eye and turned his torch onto. Ethan was staring at the shining, mirror-sharp edge of the supports upon which Jacob had been impaled, lost in thought, his hand brushing the surface of the wall. Partly inside the wall. Michael’s sudden noise of surprise shook Ethan out of his daze. He wrenched his hand from sudden pain, a chunk roughly hand-shaped torn from the wall and jaggedly embedded in his flesh…

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People Appearing (in order of appearance)

• Jacob (mentioned)
• Jerome Gévoudan – Distracted, obsessing, aggressive
• Anabell McCullogh – Trying to understand what happened.
• Ethan Clarke – Trying to forget, unsuccessfully.
• Dr Keith Arcand (first appearance)
• Michael O’Connell – Unsettled by his own actions.
• Officer Baker (first appearance) – Workshy cop who should have been watching the crime scene.

Locations

• Freddy’s Fixit Shop
• Ethan’s Apartment – A residence, not a home.
• Felicity Memorial Hospital
• Abandoned Goodwill Shop – Still a crime scene.

Chapter 2 of Under A Killing Moon

<- Welling Up | Waking Dreams ->

Earlier: Michael

Dewhurst Library. A relic of a dream of a brighter and better city. Like many others, Michael found it somewhere to stay relatively warm and dry without having to justify his existence or pay for the privilege. He spent the afternoon in the reading room, leafing through a few books that caught his interest to kill time until the alarm went and it was time to head to work. He tried not to watch the clock, that bred anxiety and ate the little time he had to himself, but he couldn’t help himself. Ten minutes left, just enough time to finish the chapter. The guy on the next table over checked his watch. Then the girl on the other side. Then the people beyond them, and the ones beyond them, radiating out like a wave of anxious clock-watching until it filled the room and they all turned as one to stare at Michael. He slunk down, buried his head in the book and pretended not to see it, and when he glanced again the room was as it was before. No stares, only the uneasy memory of dozens of eyes boring into his soul. The alarm could not go off quick enough, and he headed to work with his head down.

It was sometime after midnight when Michael got out of Oasis. The bar was still open but the crowd was thin due to the season and management decided to reduce costs by cutting hours from surplus staff. That suited him fine. The incident at the library had left him on edge and he had felt eyes on him all night. He needed to clear his head and decided on some retributive violence against the system. With spray paint and collapsible baton in hand, he started on a circuitous walk to psyche himself up and to approach the parking lot by a different direction. Halfway there, he heard a scream and saw a junkie attacking a doctor. His grip on the baton tightened. Maybe it wouldn’t be glass getting broken tonight…

Earlier: Jerome

A few hours after sunset Jerome made his way from the Fixit Shop to the club. He headed for an inconspicuous basement doorway tucked between a payday loan shop and a palm reader on Franklin street, a sign on the door read “Chakri Herbery, Authentic Thai Remedies” under a logo of a golden disc. Jerome greeted and was ignored by the guys behind the counter as he walked past the displays of herbal supplements and through an unmarked door. Down a flight of well-worn stairs was the gym, racks of weights and equipment sitting against bare brick walls with the fighting ring sitting at the heart of it all. He tried to keep to his usual corner and work through his reps out of the way of the more serious types, but Mr King laid an arm on his shoulder and smiled in a way that brooked no argument. Reps and working punchbags could only go so far, it was time to get into the ring.

Jerome found himself set up against one of the meatheads, a tanned heavyweight with frosted tips called Chet who insisted the swastika on his shoulder was a manji. The fight went better than he expected, blocking his opponent’s attacks and hesitant to strike back until something caught his eye. Among the dozen people watching the fight was someone Jerome had never seen before – an older man with steel-grey hair and black eyes, dressed in a grey tracksuit with creases so sharp it seemed to have been ironed. He was milling about the crowd, moving through it without noticing the existence of anyone else, unblinking black eyes set on the fight. On Jerome.

Chet took advantage of Jerome’s distraction to get around his guard. Jerome instinctively slipped around the strike and retaliated with a fierce strike that sent Chet sprawling and shook himself out of the daze. He froze, realised what he had done and immediately tried to apologise. Chet ignored him and instead laid into Jerome with a chain of powerful blows. The last thing Jerome saw before his head hit the mat was the black-eyed man leering close to the ring, lips split into a wide grin that showed far too many teeth.

Mr King helped Jerome to his feet, checking him over to make sure nothing was broken and chiding him only a little for letting his guard down. Good hit, mĕe, do that more often… Of Chet or the black-eyed man, there was no sign. Jerome spent another hour at the club trying to burn off the adrenaline, but no matter what he did he could not wind down. He was still wired when he got home and decided to take a run to try to try and clear his head. And there he heard the altercation

Choosing Violence

Ethan was trying in vain to flee from the man whose teeth were closed about the meat of his forearm. A cry of “what the fuck, Jacob?!” came from an alleyway he had passed earlier. Anabell, who had been tracking her friend down to give him another dose and keep him from going cold turkey, had just seen him go for Ethan like a starving man for a steak. Most of the few other people on the street were keeping their distance, better to not get involved and who knew what diseases the junkie was carrying. But not all of them. Michael tightened his grip on his collapsible baton and steeled himself to mete out furious anger, but before he could do so chaos ensued.

Anabell crossed the road at a sprint and slammed into Jacob to the sound of a scream that she didn’t even realise was coming from her own throat. He shuddered back from the impact and she froze, she had been aiming just to separate him from the doctor, she thought she had been… Taking advantage of this moment of confusion, Jacob wheeled around and turned on Anabell, eyes like pinpricks, Ethan’s blood about his mouth and flecks of skin and muscle between his crooked teeth. Before she could react, he launched himself at her, spindly hands closing about her like a vice and his teeth digging into her flesh.

Jerome saw all this from half a block away and dithered until the urge to act overcame his learned instincts to not get involved. He tried to get between the brawlers and separate them just as Michael moved to strike Jacob. In the chaos, Michael’s baton was knocked from his grip and Jerome took an elbow to the temple, sending him staggering back in pain. Anabell tried to wrench herself free from Jacob’s iron grip to no avail, as he started to drag her with him toward an alleyway, aware he was outnumbered. In between the sharp mumbles of hungry and cold was an alien word that rumbled like a growl deep in his throat: “uu-raa-tha”

Michael grasped for a weapon and found one of his cans of paint, which he promptly turned on Jacob as improvised bear spray. Half-blind and choking on paint, Jacob staggered on still. He dragged Anabell into the alleyway one-handed, feeling and flailing his way to a door which he wrenched open with a squeal of half-rusted metal.

Throughout all this, Ethan had been struggling to find his feet and his phone, the 911 operator still on the line trying to get someone to answer to him. He tried to explain what had happened, slipping into cold medical professionalism to bury his terror, and demanded police and EMTs as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, Jerome and Michael decided to take matters into their own hands to stop this before Anabell was dragged into a dark fate long before the BCPD arrived. They succeeded, far more so than they intended. Michael had scooped a bottle from the alleyway and intended to break it over Jacob’s head, and instead drove the broken end of it into his ribcage with a wet, tearing sound. A moment later, Jerome’s kick, intended simply to knock Jacob’s legs out from under him, shattered his knee with a sickening snap. A keening, inhuman wail rose from Jacob and he released Anabell, half-falling, half-staggering into the darkness of the open door.

Into the Dark

Silence fell on the alleyway. Uneasy looks were shared. Jerome stared at the ground, muttering how he never meant to do that. Michael simply crumpled to his knees, gorge rising in his throat and spattering onto the cold concrete. Anabell was the first to speak, insisting she was going in there to get her friend back as she dusted herself off and tied her sleeve tight over the wound that friend had left in her. Ethan tried to fuss, insisted they should wait for the police and EMTs and, when that failed, buried fear with professionalism. He ordered Jerome to keep an eye on Michael and followed Anabell through the door into the dark. Jacob had been his patient…

Jerome lingered uncertainly in the alleyway, not sure what he could do for Michael who had by now gotten himself together and was wavering on the edge of retreat. He fell back on nervous politeness, introduced himself and following the others into the dark. Michael followed soon after, unsettled by something he had seen in Jerome’s eyes but not wanting to be left alone in the gloom of the alley.

The door lead into the back rooms of a goodwill shop, obviously long abandoned. Half-empty shelves and racks of unwanted clothing hung hung in a dust-filled gloom, lit only by the city lights filtering through a filthy skylight. Yet it was enough to see a trail of blood spatter, disturbed dust and boxes shoved aside leading to another door. Beyond were stairs leading down into a darkness rich with the smells of vermin and mouldering cloth. The four argued, Ethan insisting that Jerome and Michael stay there but no-one was convinced safety, preferring the safety of numbers as they proceeded down into the basement.

Down the stairs was a basement storeroom, half-filled with lumpen sacks each large enough to hold a human torso. Several had split open, gnawed edges revealing clothing and the cold glint of verminous eyes. The faint city lights could not reach far and they resorted to torches – Ethan’s examination torch and something jury-rigged that Jerome had been tinkering with. Under those faint lights shadows revealed themselves to be clusters of roaches that fled for darker corners. The trail of blood led to another door lay on the far wall, paint peeling from old, half-rotten wood, and slightly ajar.

Beyond this older door lay more stairs, much older and bowed with age and decay. Anabell cautioned the others to take care, this looked like an entry to the Vaults and such places were dangerous to the unwary. With that said, she started down them, stepping light and fast with a practiced mix of haste and caution. The stairs clung tenaciously to a stone wall and lead down into a cavernous expanse, vast enough that they could hear their own voices echoing and their puny torches could not see the walls.

At the bottom was a stone floor, unfinished and rawly cut with chisel marks still visible in places, and a broad pair of double doors like those of a storm cellar set in the floor, thrown wide to expose narrow stone stairs. The stairs delved even deeper, down a narrow defile half-choked with leprous white roots and rhizomes protruding from the raw stone. And at the bottom lay Jacob, twisted and broken and dead. The body was grotesque, limbs rendered multi-jointed by sharp breaks and flesh shorn to expose bone, his ribs splayed out like jagged cannibal teeth, and yet his eyes were still open, pupils pinpricks against an unseen dreadful light.

Rising Consequence

Sounds far above dragged them from their stunned silence at the dreadful sight. It seemed the right thing to not be caught in this unpleasant place by someone else, so they begin to make their way back up the stairs, wordless and anxious. Ethan lingered until last, waiting until alone to close Jacob’s eyes and allow himself to show a moment of emotion. By the time the group reach the basement filled with sacks of clothing, the sounds above have become a voice “Blackmouth PD. Anyone in here?”

Ethan shouted up to the cop without a second thought. Michael and Anabell dived to cover, hiding amidst the sacks and rags and vermin, while Jerome stalled, unsure. The cop came down the stairs slow, cautious, flashlight out in one hand with his other resting above his pistol. He swept the room, seeing only the Ethan and Jerome before freezing at the sight of something behind them. Where the door leading down into the cavern had been is a blank wall with Jacob’s mangled, ruined form nailed to it…

Backup was called in and Jerome and Ethan were checked over by the EMTs. jerome was in shock, mumbling questions to himself about how the body could have moved. More innured to shock, or perhaps more able to suppress himself, Ethan began to give a preliminary statement to the patrol officers, delivered with just enough theatrics and volume to distract them from Michael and Anabell sneaking out into the night.

Two detectives arrived before forensics. Whitfield, a serious and intense man who seemed to know the patrol officer who found Ethan and Michael in the basement, and Matthis, an older, more worn man who arrived a few minutes later. They moved to a safe distance, well out of earshot, yet Ethan found himself able to pick up snippets of their conversation. Whitfield wanted to know what had happened to his CI, Matthis promised he would be the first to know but to not go pushing his way into other people’s cases again, especially outside his department.

Matthis talked to Ethan and Jerome to try and get some more information. Ethan stuck to the story that he had spun to the patrol officer, that he had been attacked by Jacob and Jerome had helped him, Jacob had fled into the derelict shop and he wanted to try and help him because he had treated him at the ER earlier that night and he felt he had a duty of care. Jerome was a different story, still in shock he mentioned details that Ethan had not, like Anabell and Michael, though he did not know their names.

Later that morning, after Ethan and Jerome have been finally allowed to go, after forensics have come to take their photos and while plans were being made to remove the body, something began to stir in the basement. First one rat, then two, then a dozen, then a hundred, all look at what has been wrought, staring at the twisted corpse with bright, cold eyes.

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People Appearing (in order of appearance)

• Michael O’Connell – Unsettled by being watched.
• Jerome Gévoudan – More capable of violence than he thought.
• Mr King (first appearance) – Pleased with Jerome’s prowess.
• Chet (first appearance) – Less pleased with Jerome’s prowess.
• The man in a grey tracksuit – Enjoyed the sight of Jerome and Chet’s fight.
• Jacob (death) – Struggled violently, died unnaturally.
• Ethan Clarke – Did what he thought was the right thing.
• Anabell McCullogh – Tried to do right by a friend.
• Officer Jiménez (first appearance) – Shocked by discoveries.
• Det. Whitfield (first appearance) – Interested in Jacob’s death.
• Det. Matthis (first appearance) – Investigating and curious.

Locations

• Dewhurst Library – struggling institution, barely hanging on.
• Oasis – trendy nightclub in gentrified area west of Merritt.
• Chakri’s – herbal supplement shop and private gym.
• The streets of Merritt
• Abandoned Goodwill shop
• The Blackmouth Vaults

Chapter 1 of Under A Killing Moon

– | Digging Down ->

The First Dream

Night time on the streets, snow and ash are falling, pooling about your feet as you walk. Its cold, bitterly so, the chill like a knife in your chest with every breath. All around you the buildings rise tall and thin like crooked grey teeth, lightless and dead. The only light from motes and sparks from a distant fire, hidden beyond the twisted shadow buildings. And the moon. The moon looms huge and brilliant, close enough to see a twisted whorl has been hacked into its surface, lambent quicksilver blood seeping up from the wound and dripping down onto the world. And then you wake up…

Waking

First to wake is Jerome, stunned and uneasy, shaking off the sensation of being trapped in the endless now of the dream for what felt like an eternity. He coasted through waking and readying himself to face the world until shaken out of his thoughts by his mom’s mothering.

As Jerome made his way to Freddy’s Fixit Shop for work, Annabel from the dream with a violent start that sent her sleepig bag and her cat flying and set the car alarm blaring. She silenced the device by pulling a few wires, calmed the startled cat and corralled it into her backpack, before heading for Memorial Park to play the sympathy card to well-off types and score enough money to eat.

Michael stirred from his third experience of the dream, worn thin and tired as sleep brought no rest. He tired to sneak out of the house to avoid drawing the attention of his father, and, when that failed, simply ran. The library would be warm and could wait until the bar opened there, where would be no-one to bother him.

Finally, Ethan, catching some sleep in a quiet room while waiting for the second half of a split shift. He refused to react to the dream, pushed it down into the well of everything else that wasn’t relevant and focussed on getting whatever food he could before he had to get back to the ER.

Needful Things

Later that afternoon, Anabell encountered Jacob. He was twitchier than usual, eyes dark with lack of sleep or withdrawal, and complaining about the cold. The police and city response to Sandoval’s disappearance was making things difficult – sure, loads of poor and homeless folks disappear and no-one cares but one teacher disappears into the Vaults and people start doing things. It would blow over soon enough, once the news found some other thing to care about, but they were hassling people, blocking accessways, sending dealers to ground. The hooch wasn’t cutting it and Jacob recruited Anabell to come help scam pain meds from the ER.

They weren’t very good at it, but they didn’t need to be. Felicity Memorial was understaffed and underfunded, and Jacob’s claims of pain from a broken arm was enough to get past the triage nurse who had more important things to care about. It was early evening by the time they were seen by Dr Clarke and things did not go well. Jacob’s story changed several times, from a new break to a sprain to an old break that never healed right, which was revealed by examination to be true. Anabell’s moral support for her poor injured friend becoming cajoling as Ethan wavered on how to help a man obviously in pain when it wasn’t essential medical care and they obviously had no insurance.

Uneasy and unsettled by something he could not identify, Ethan left the two in the examination room to seek advice from his superior Dr Monroe, accidentally leaving his prescription pad behind in a moment of distraction. Anabell seized the opportunity, copying the signature from its pressure indentation and making a counterfeit script for Vicodin, that she stuffed into a pocket just in time as the doctors returns. Dr Monroe took a long look over the room and sent Anabell and Jacob on their way with information on an addiction support group. Once alone with Ethan, she gave him a sharp warning about taking care of his equipment. The paperwork for whatever script had been made would get lost the system, but Dr Monroe made it abundantly clear that if anything like that happened again there would be serious consequences.

Paths Crossing in the Night

Late that evening, Ethan took a walk to clear his head before driving home and spotted Jacob watching him from an alleyway, battered and worn even thinner than before. He ignored the vagrant, angry at being conned and chewed out, and walked on. Footsteps behind him. Jacob, closeby, shivering and muttering so cold, so cold it burns. Unable to bring himself to walk away, Ethan draped his coat about the man and started to call 911 for an ambulance as his muttering grew odder – so cold, so hungry, its hungry, so hungry. Just as the operator picked up the call, the phone was knocked from Ethan’s hand as Jacob lunges at him and bites down on the flesh of his arm…

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People Appearing

• Jerome Gévoudan (first appearance) – Unsettled by dreams.
• Jerome’s mother (first appearance) – Trying her best for the family.
• Anabell McCullogh (first appearance) – Surviving any way she can.
• Michael O’Connell (first appearance) – Keeping his head down.
• Ethan Clarke (first appearance) – Facing the challenges of helping within a callous system.
• Jacob (first appearance) – Worn down, on edge, needed a fix.
• Cynthia Monroe (first appearance) – Managing the ER to help as many as she can.

Locations

• Memorial Park
• Felicity Moth Memorial Hospital
• The streets of Merritt