//------------------------------// // Souls // Story: Roadtrip // by enamis //------------------------------// . I ran. . Holy mother of tits mcgee I fucking ran. I didn’t even care that if I stopped I would get my scrawny ass mowed down by my two shopping-cart-wagons I was still somehow managing to drag with me, because for the first time in my meager existence on this entire fucking planet I knew what it was like to run for my life. Maybe not just mine. . I booked it. . HARD. . By the time I’d made it a solid three and a half blocks and was wheezing my lungs out through my ass the music could be heard clearer and clearer by the second, ever above my deadass panting. My pace slowed to what I could probably call a ‘trot’ and I struggled to catch my breath. I had gotten twice as good at running in gym over the past two years and it was the only thing that was keeping me going at the moment. At least my liver didn’t feel like it was imploding, so that was always a plus. That is if I had a liver. I strained my hearing as best I could trying to pick out the lyrics. The destination was the same as my original one, if only I could figure out what was… /Dievs, svētī Latviju, Mūs' dārgo tēviju, Svētī jel Latviju, Ak, svētī jel to! Kur latvju meitas zied, Kur latvju dēli dzied, Laid mums tur laimē diet, Mūs' Latvijā!/ I froze. “Anthem…” I muttered to no one, stopping in my tracks, only now noticing Bella skittering to a stop beside me. “Anthem.” I repeated, much louder. I couldn’t help the unholy grin appearing across my changed face. I picked up my pace. . The buildings surrounding me from all sides stood as tall and imposing as ever before, their dark windows reflecting the midsummer sunlight across the pavement. I had managed to get my wits about me and had begun a steady pace down the main boulevard on this side of the city, leading to the very heart of my hometown. The music was almost deafening now as a came to the intersection just past a park with a huge golden-domed church on my right and some probably political building on my left. I stopped once more and gazed up at the very embodiment of my nation’s sovereignty and freedom. A forty-something meter tall pillar of granite topped with ‘Liberty’ wearing our traditional garbs and holding up three golden stars symbolizing the three old Districts and built to memorialize the those dead in wars leading to our independence. Aptly named the Freedom Monument. Creative, I know. Nevertheless it still filled me with a dead sense of pride. It reminded me of home. . The music was so loud here it made me put my headphones back in my earholes just to try and cancel out some of the noise. Wherever the speakers were, they were definitely close. I paused. Unhitching myself from my carts I quickly rummaged through one of the bags attached to the side and fished out a hunting knife I’d gotten from a fishing outlet somewhere along the way. That said I was well aware of just how much of a pussy I am and knew right away if it came down to it I’d get my shit thoroughly fucked, but being prepared had paid off so far. I wrapped the belt of the holster around my chest for easy grabbing and hid the knife itself under my jacket and huge wing. I motioned for Bella to stay and she obeyed. … Here we go. I scurried around the monument. . And froze. . Two… Things slowly trodded across the huge open plaza, flanked from both sides by parks and canal running underneath the way leading into Old Town proper. The biggest was the most human-like and for a second I felt nothing but pure, blazing fury at being turned into something out of a history textbook instead of remaining my old self, as shit as I was. That anger quickly simmered when I realized I recognized IT from said metaphorical textbook. With the head of an oxen and the body of a human with dark, devil-looking cloven hooves I was looking at none other than a minotaur. What I assumed was a he, from the massive, curved ivory horns, looked to have short fur all over his body colored gray with the slightest tint of brown when the light hit him just right, the only exception being a fuzz-less pink nose in a triangle shape towards his forehead. He had hair, much like a human, curly and colored a dark brick red, along with tiny little cow ears just before his horns coming out the side of his skull. He was about as bare as mua’, only wearing dark green cargo shorts with bulging pockets, a thin cow-like tail sticking out of one pant leg. The person next to him was actually kind of like me but… not… Something (terrifying) in my head compelled me to call it a her, and she seemed just about as big as me. Then again my sense of scale had gotten shat up the wazoo so I wasn’t exactly sure about that last part. She looked sort of… horse-like, but all wrong, with a huge head and thick legs and bright neon yellow eyes about as big as mine (and equally as cool looking). She was pale violet and looked pretty fuzzy even from a distance, especially her absolutely humongous ears which reminded more of floppy dog ears only sticking upright. I squinted and saw what looked like those shit, over-expensive, Dre-looking and bright red headphones over said ears. She seemed to have stuck them on backwards, with the band sitting on her nape. Then again I guess with ears that big she didn’t have much of an option. The rest of her wasn’t as noteworthy, with hair and a full, fluffy tail colored pale black with maybe a hint of purple, and patches that looked a bit like she was graying. She was holding something in her mouth that I couldn’t quite make out (it might’ve been a book) and wearing a thick-looking red skirt and some raggedy-ass socks on her… hooves, I guess… What really caught my attention was the two dark patches of leathery something tucked against her back. Looks like I wasn’t the only flying thing around here. . I stared at them for a bit. The minotaur was carrying a huge stack of those plastic boxy containers, all balanced atop one another and against his (actually impressively muscular) chest. There was a loud thud I managed to hear even over the music, as what looked like a five liter bottle of water he was carrying up top tipped and fell, crashing into the asphalt making the horse-woman jump back with a yelp, dropping whatever she was holding. The minotaur said something to her but I couldn’t quite hear as he lowered the boxes to the ground. The bottle wasn’t even scaved but he still looked kinda’ guilty. I made my move. With as much confidence as I could muster (and my very molecules shuddering in utter terror) I strolled out of my hiding place in the shadow of the Monument and into the open air. I added a bit more jig to walk than I was used to and it didn’t take long before the two noticed me. They both seemed to freeze up, just staring, and I couldn’t help a giddy smile, no doubt flashing my razor-like teeth. The guy was the first to react, straightening his posture, his face lighting up as I came closer. “Human!” he called out over the music in a deep, booming voice. It was so good to hear another Latvian again. “Or, I don’t know, horse.” He added, eyes scanning me over as I stopped a good three meters in front of him. He reached to fumble for something in his pockets before finally managing to pull out what looked like a small remote. He turned towards Bastejkalns Park and gently tapped a button. Suddenly I realized I could hear again which was… pretty great because I was starting to go fucking deaf. The music stayed as background noise but thankfully I could tune it out. “You are a Latvian right? You can understand what I'm saying?” he turned back to me, the horse-woman peering around his massive frame, which I realized might have been about three times my size. Shit, I was tiny. “Yep.” I replied, suddenly unsure what to even say. We stared at each other for a bit just kind of taking in the fact that we were here. “Ya know… um…” he stammered, “I still wasn’t convinced that I, I don’t know, didn’t just lose my mind at some point but…” He took a deep breath and smiled. “It’s good to see another person -eerrr- former person.” “I share that sentiment like you wouldn’t believe.” Ahhh, deadpanness, you never fail me. “Are you… alone? Where did you even come from? We’ve been blasting the anthem for like two weeks straight, I can hear it echoing in my freaking head even when it’s off.” I hesitated. Trust was no longer something I did. Not again, never again. “I’d say partially alone.” I turned to face the Monument and called out in a cutesy voice. “BELLA! BELLA BELLA BELLABELLABELLA!” With a bark the white mutt rounded the corner and dashed at me coming to a stop at my side. She paused before looking at the two people-not-people before us and went to go sniff them all over. I managed to catch a pained look in both their faces as the dog twisted herself around the two’s legs. I wonder. “Heh, lucky, all we ever get are pigeons.” He paused while Bella dashed between his legs and then took off towards the park. “And cats I guess.” … Hurray silence. The woman poked him in the back of his leg, getting both our attention. “Maybe go sit?” My guess was correct and she was indeed a she, with a melodic but also firm voice, through what confused me most was her speaking in English. Along with that she had a strange accent to her, one that faintly reminded of my classmates’ attempts at trying to speak the same language I’d been studying since I was three. That and her sentence structure was shit, like, seriously. “Yeah, good thought. We’ve all probably been on our legs the entire day.” It took me a second for my mind to switch gears between languages, but I managed with only blankly staring at the guy in front for maaaaybe half a second tops. He began to turn to follow the horse-woman but I spoke up beforehand. “Hold up!” He turned to look at me and I choked on a sentence. “You guys have power right? Do you mind if go charge all my shit while were… whatever?” He gave me a blank look and blinked before smiling. “Oh, yeah sure, totally. We have an outlet by one of the generators in the booth. Where is your stuff anyway? You’re not, like, magicking it under your wings or something, right?” “Heh, no, no…” I rubbed the back of my head because I didn’t know what to do with my limbs. “It’s right around /Milda/, I’ll grab it.” And so I did. Dragging two shopping carts worth of shit behind me and a faint smile on my not-lips as I came closer to admire the dude’s incredibly impressed ‘Holy Shit’-face. And by god did that make me feel good about myself. He led me to some real shitty box-booth-looking thing off to the side by the edge of the bridge-square. Thing looked like it was made out of cardboard, a bunch of sports shit all over the walls, none of which I recognized since it was… well it was fucking sports. It had been cleared out it seemed, wires and gas cans stacked against one of the only two walls the thing had and a meaty-looking generator against the other. A table had been dragged out in the middle of the booth and under it, and above it, and around the side were like seven four-socketed extensions cords. What could you do with more than two of those? Fuck if I knew. At least the place had a roof. And duct tape. A lot of friggen duct tape. By god it was everywhere. Guy motioned for me to park my shit ‘inside’ and so I did. It took me a solid five minutes to dig out the cords for my phone and lappy but I eventually got it all set up while myth-boy refueled the generator. I was actually amazed at how he knew how to work it. Then again, it couldn’t have been that hard, right? He gave me a look before yanking a cord, like ones on lawnmowers, and the cocking thing almost made my ears bleed from the noise. I quickly plugged in my extension cord into the one of the holes in the generator proper and bolted. Fucking ow. “C’mon let's go sit down!” The minotaur shouted over the roar of the generator and I just kind of nodded as he lead the way away from the noise and into the park itself, closer to the edge of the canal. There, under one of those white, semi-plastic garden tents, only twice the size, was one of the greatest hangout spots I’d seen in my life. The transparent plastic flaps of the tent were pulled back on one side, exposing a sea of rainbow beanbag chairs laid in a sitable pile. Near the side there was another table full of boxes and twenty billionty snacks and drinks laid all over it. Down by the corner there was what look to be huge TV screen and some wires poking out the box it was sitting in and all over the place with another box which what looked to be stuffed full of DVD cases. In front of the tent a bit away from the entrance was the biggest fucking grill I’d seen in my short life, half-buried in the ground. It was full of ash and coals and a bit of stacked logs, a bigger pile of them by the ancient oaks nearby, half covered by a tarp and a plastic container with probably lighter fluid bottles in it next to it. There were three beanbag thrones laid out near the would-be firepit, and horse-woman was just finishing dragging the last in place. When she saw us approach she smiled and walked back to the tent only to return with a basket full of bottles and chips in her jaws. I kind of awkwardly shuffled in place for a bit, not knowing how to proceed. It was like visiting a schoolmate’s house for the first time and their mom was super nice trying to get you to ‘feel at home’ but your friend was busy taking the worlds longest shit so you just stood there in the hallway not sure what to do with yourself waiting for them to come back so you can pretend you were admiring the vomit stain they called art on the wall. Very similar. Evidently I got over myself at some point and shuffled to the single unoccupied beanbag throne opposite to the two the ‘homeowners’ as it were, were occupying. I let out a long, deep sigh as I laid down and let myself sink into the cushion, stomach first. Yes. This is what I needed. The basket of what I saw were *ahem* refrushmunts (hon-hon) *cough*, got passed about a bit as everyone (two out of three (four?) of us since Bella had fucked off at some point during all of this) picked out whatever. The basket came to me eventually and I poked through it, picking out what looked to be a random beer. I kind of just tapped the cap and it came off (go me) and took a lil’ sip. It was okay. “So, um, I feel like a bit of an ass since we haven’t exactly introduced ourselves.” Minotaur-guy spoke up while he popped the tab off a Red Bull (huehuehuehuehue), nearly taking the entire top of the huge-ass can off before he- holy tits he chugged the entire thing in one go. My expression must’ve betrayed the slew of swears of amazement going through my brain because the horse-woman started snickering from beside me. The minotaur did one of those quiet burps and took one look at my face and I swear he actually got kind of flustered. “I need a lot of calories…” he lamely muttered as I was trying to get my jaw off the floor. It took several seconds of silence and I noticed he was working his jaw, about to say something so I just kind of vomited out my question in one go. “So why are we talking English anyway? We’re Latvians in Latvia knowing Latvian and, and, and-” “Oh, that.” He reached over towards the bottles leaning against the woman’s ‘throne’ as she nudged one with her leg (back hoof?) in his direction. “She doesn’t know Latvian.” He motioned with the bottle to our silent companion. Oh. “Oh.” “Yeah, it’s not the best but at least we can actually, ya’ know, communicate and stuff, even if she’s preeeety garbage at-OW.” Horse-lady did not seem to like that comment as she had unfurled her leathery wings and slapped the side of the dude’s arm with the, actually kinda’ sharp-looking, tips. “She has name.” Like? “My name is…” she hesitated as she turned to look me in the -ohgodwhyisshestaringintomysouldohgodmakeitstop- “Kaja.” “Kaja…” I repeated back, simply. She just kind of looked at me. “Kaaaaaja.” I blinked. “No offense but it sounds really close to /kaija/, as in, which means seagull…” Now it was her time to blink. Blink. She furrowed her brows at me. “I'm sorry! It’s just the first thing that came to mind!” Before anything could escalate there was snort of laughter from our side and the minotaur had his head leaned back and a grin of his face. “Heeee~h… Seagull…” “Hey!” “I’m sorry, Kaj, but eagle-lady does have a point. Ffff-hah, I can't believe I didn’t notice that.” “Laugh, laugh, you two people. Maybe not tell all story.” She looked down into the beer bottle still clasped inbetwixt her hooves. I swear a caught a smile in the corner of her mouth and the tone she spoke in was that which I shared with my old classmates in our usual riffing sessions. “C’mon, Kaj, story! Story!” Myth-man did a mock-chant. “It’s not like we have anything better to do.” “You already hear it one time, stupid!” She shouted at him, but her smirk betrayed whatever she was going for. After about a second more of giggling her expression turned… dark. She cleared her throat and raised up her head in what was probably a dignified gesture. I wouldn’t know. “Oke’. Whatever. Not long story. I am forty-three. I live in Tartu. Come to Riga with two friends for basketball festival and beer. Have fun. Wake up /lilla/ bird-horse.” … … Wow that was underwhelming. … I chewed some air for a bit and just kind of let out a weak ‘huh’. I think they took it as a sign. “My turn then.” The minotaur looked between us and then down at his drink. He paused before speaking, probably gathering his thoughts. “Getting the basics out of the way: My name’s Carl /Jansons/, I'm nineteen, I used to live a few blocks from here in Old Town with my mom and brother when shit hit the fan and I’ve been camping here for a while… like, what’s it been-” he looked at Kaja who just kind of shrugged “-like a month or something?” “But yeah. There was this basketball thing happening right in the Monument square and they had portable generators for the merch booth and two more for some stage thing and booth-thing down in the park. They're gas, thankfully so we run them a few hours a day to charge all our chargeable things, ‘n ya’ know. Just kind of making do here, as best we can with everyone gone.” He had sweet smile. “'Kay, that’s us done. Your turn.” Carl looked at me expectantly. … waitwhat . “I.” . I. . I didn’t… . I froze… . Breathe. . “Diana.” . Breathe. . “I… I live a few kilometers from here. By /Brasa/.” Breathe. “Lived.” Breathe. “I went on a little weekend vacation to our summer home down to Vidzeme with my mom and oma. And then… then the world just decided to end so I… walked.” … “For three hundred motherfucking kilometers I walked to a dead and empty home after the fucking Rapture.” . “And now I'm fucking here and I don’t know what the ever-loving fuck happens next because the entire fucking world is GONE!” . I didn’t realize my hand was on my face until I had to look up from over my palm to see the faces of the only two strangers still left in the world. Their looks of sympathy did not surprise me. Not the slightest. Everything was coming out like vomit. . “But you know what tho’? I don’t care. I just don’t care anymore. Not a single teeny, tiny fucking bit. I am DONE. I am done keeping up appearances and I am done being nice to every little shitstain that comes in my direction because I'm supposed to. I am done trying to keep up a nice looking oh-so public façade for a future I can’t have anymore. There is no more faking and forced interactions with proper people and constantly censoring how many fucking fucks per minute I can manage because there ain’t anyone around anymore to BOTHER. That’s why I'm done with all this- I'm done with the life I had because there's nothing left on it. I'm done pretending… This is me. A bitter, selfish, swearing, insecure little shithead of a brat and I don’t care what anyone thinks of me. The word is gone. Done. Poof. Nada. Fucked right off into space. And what's even the fucking point of going if I'm not true to myself, if I've never been. I don’t think I even remember what I am deep down. What I was. What I could have been. All I ever know is what I was supposed to look like on the outside. Even for friends. Even for family… And now it’s over. Just like that. Like it should be. I'm done being… half of me… the asshole needs to see the light again and I'm just so tired of keeping her under lock and key. It’s over. I am who I am. No more pretending to be better. And if no one likes me that’s fine. I wouldn’t like a cunt like me either…” I looked down at the grass between my fingertips. I think I might’ve dropped my beer during all this explosive venting, but like I said - I was done being anyone but pure, untainted me. Tumors and all. And I wasn’t going to cry over spilled beer either, the world was my oyster and even if the two bastards that still listened to all that, bless the fuckers, hated me… that was fine. I was used to being alone. I liked it, even. Liberating. . . We sat there in silence for a long time. I think it was too awkward for them to say anything. Meanwhile I picked out another bottle. I might’ve been underage, but it’s not like there were any coppers around to take me to drunk-kiddie jail. Oooh, cherry. I fumbled with my pocketknife’s bottle opener. Bless having thumbs. After a fizz and pop and crackle and me having a nice, refreshing, flavorful sip that felt like something tart (that’s a word people use, right?) fucked something fizzy on top of a dark beer and exploded in my mouth and me going ‘aaah’ because fuck you that’s why, I cleared my throat. Man, Carl looked like he was on the edge of a depression-induced meltdown. “Now that that fucker is out of the way, want to hear how I went rodeling? I promise it’s slightly less depressing!” I am a fucking comedian. “So, anyway, it was like, a day ago? Two? I couldn’t keep track of dates when I had them on every screen I looked at… So anyway-” And I talked. Because it felt good. It felt so spectaculasly good to just yammer on about all the shit that mattered to me and have people there that at least pretended to listen. So I talked and I talked and they kept listening and after a while the smiles came back and we laughed at how Bella freaked the fuck out of me on a daily basis and they yammered back of being chased by a flock of pigeons for two days straight once and I laughed so hard it felt like I was going to die. And the bottles and cans of beer and cola kept piling up, mostly thanks to Carl since he basically tanked like five in one go while me and bird-horse were queen lightweights, but it was okay because it felt amazing and I didn’t care I was going to ruin all this good by being the black, tainted mess of a human being that I knew I was, because for just one glorious evening I could be my deep down and the world didn’t give a single fuck. . o.O.o .