Shane Kroetsch

Dark and Introspective Fiction

Flash Fiction

Danger

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Danger. That’s what the sign says. Door must not be opened except at stations. It’s like seeing, Caution: Contents Hot, on a coffee cup. If you don’t know, you deserve what you get. If you do, maybe it’s a way of getting what you deserve.

The train car is half empty. Between travel restrictions and mandatory shifts below surface, Sunday mornings are slow. Fewer passengers. Less security. I stand and hold the metal bar on the back wall as the tracks begin to rise.  The creak of the near two-hundred-year-old wood floor is insignificant to the groans of the car as it strains around a bend.

The need for transportation saved these relics from being recycled. One of the many instances of our new reality after the solar storms. Steam returned to favour when our ability to harness electricity in a reliable fashion failed. Demolition is no longer a brute endeavour. Because trees no longer grow, the integrity of every precious reclaimed piece has to be maintained.

Two cars up, the siren sounds. Then the car ahead. The person closest in our car stands, and illuminated by the dim oil lamps, turns the crank. The wail continues on down the line. I shield my eyes, and we blast through to the surface. Even through the treated glass, the sunlight carries power. I feel it through the toes of my shoes.

I look along the rows of seats. Some of the other passengers have donned their goggles. All face away. Alone, but together. I prefer the former, especially now. The train lumbers on. I don’t have much time, so I step toward the door. Nobody turns to watch. I take another, grip the silver knob, then slowly unlatch the draw bolt.

The door snaps open and my skin is on fire. If not in a literal sense, then close enough to. I stare into the light until my vision is taken. My lungs fill with scalding air as I step through the door. My feet leave the wood floor and I am delivered to my fate.

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Photo by britt gaiser on Unsplash

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Lost and Found

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“Excuse me…”

I lowered and folded my newspaper onto my lap. I wasn’t looking to be interrupted, and I’m sure it showed, right up until I looked into those eyes.

I don’t read a lot of books, but it felt like I had been dropped smack dab in the middle of a dime store paperback. The sky was bluer than I remembered it being before, the birds sang beautiful melodies, and all that. When I say she could have been a model, it’s the truest words to ever leave my mouth. The only reason I could think of to look away would be to figure out where the photographer was hiding.

“Would you happen to know when the next train is due to arrive?”

It took a moment to shift my brain into gear. I stole a glance at my watch and stuttered before I was able to work my lips enough to speak the Queen’s English. “About half-past. I mean, ‘bout five or so minutes from now.”

She smiled and I knew I could die a happy man. “Thank you, that’s perfect.” She motioned a gloved hand to the empty seat beside me. “May I?”

I almost told her I’d give her my last twenty bucks if she would but smartened up at the last second. “Of course.”

I tucked the paper between my leg and the arm of the bench. She sat with her back straight and her purse on her lap. After looking both ways along the tracks, she looked at me from the corner of her eye. “Nice watch, by the way.”

“Oh, thanks.” I shook it on my wrist. “A friend gave it to me.”

“Must be some friend.”

I shrugged. “It was a unique situation.”

“Forgive me, I should have introduced myself.” She held out a hand, like a lady used to. “Rochelle.”

I was as awkward as ever, grabbed the tips of her fingers and bobbed them once or twice. I don’t know about her, but I did my best to pretend it never happened. “Gerald.”

Gerald? Jesus H Christ. Not sure why I slipped up and used my real name. Besides, nobody called me that but my mother.

“Where are you off to today, Gerald?”

“Oh, you know, the city.”

She leaned forward on one knee, raised an eyebrow and gave a mischievous smile. “Business, or pleasure?”

“Business.”

“And what is it you do? For business.”

I had to give my collar a tug so as to breathe right. “A little of this, a little of that. I find things, mostly.”

She rested her chin on her closed fist and bit at her bottom lip. “Intriguing.”

The sensation started in my feet and travelled up to my chest. At first, I thought it might be a heart attack. Turns out it was the south-bound train.

I turned to solid marble when she leaned in and put a hand on my knee. “I do wish we had more time to chat. Perhaps fortune will smile upon us and we will meet again one day.

I nodded but couldn’t manage much else. Lucky I didn’t drool, I guess. She stood and glided along the platform, disappeared around the ticket booth. The train ground to a halt in front of me. The smoke and racket hardly registered. I let out a breath and picked up the paper. When I lifted my wrist to check my watch, it wasn’t there. Pressure rose up in my temples, like a volcano about to blow. I set a hand on the pocket where I kept my wallet. It was flat. I had to shake my head. Taken by a pretty face. Again.

I reached inside my jacket. The ticket was still there, at least. It meant I could get to the job and get paid. After that I’d be in a good spot to take a few days off and go find Rochelle, if that was even her name, and see about getting my watch back.

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Photo by Anna Auza on Unsplash

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Stay Safe

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Mello closed one eye and spun the spoked wheel. He narrowed in on the slight wobble as the tick, tick, tick slowed. He held the wheel to stop it, his thumb strategically placed.

            “What are you doing?”

            Mello dug in his pocket for the tiny spanner he found while on their run into the north-east quadrant of the city. “Fine tuning.”

            Sierra put her hands in her pockets and looked to the end of the alley. “Please don’t tell me you were dumpster diving again.”

            Mello shrugged. “Couldn’t help it.” He slipped the spanner over one of the spokes and twisted. The twang of metal rang out as it gave and turned.

            “It’s going to slow us down.”

            “It won’t slow us down.” Mello adjusted the spokes on either side, then closed his eye and spun the wheel again. “I can build a trailer. We can get around faster.”

            Sierra sighed. “It’s more to worry about. We’ll be a bigger target.”

            A shadow passed overhead, near silent, but with the tell-tale scent of ozone. Sierra pushed back against the wall. Only Mello’s eyes moved as he scanned the thin strip of sky above them. When dim light returned, he put the spanner back in his pocket, then stood and flipped the bike upright. “We can carry more. Won’t have to be looking for supplies all the time.”

            Sierra crouched down. “We have a good system, Mel. Stay agile. Stay safe.”

            Mello smiled as he pulled on the levers and pushed the bike forward and back. “I promise, I’ll dump it the second it causes a problem.”

            Sierra lowered her eyes. “I don’t know…”

            At the mouth of the alley, a blur of colour flashed past, then another. Soon they heard shouting, and a scream. Sierra hefted a tall backpack from the ground beside her and slipped it over her shoulder. “I guess we’ll have to argue about this later. We need to go.”

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Photo by Amy Elting on Unsplash

The Demon

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I turned the light on and pointed it toward the painting on the wall. At first, the image was dull and lifeless. Then the brush strokes swelled. They flowed and shrank, as the demon opened its eyes. It watched me in silence. What it hoped to see, I was never sure. When it was finished, it focused an unknown object across the room.

“My task is complete. Set me free.”

“No,” I said. “I quite enjoy our arrangement.”

Its lip curled, and its eyes grew dark as they turned back to me. “We had a deal.”

“A deal that is no more a thing than the words spoken to seal it. If our positions were reversed, I doubt you would think twice about doing the same.”

The demon bared needle-like teeth and eased its eyes shut. “When I escape this prison, know that the tasks I have been performing will be a kindness compared to your fate.” I shrugged. “We’ll deal with that when the time comes. Until then, I have something I need you to take care of.”

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Long Live the King

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It’s quiet. For some reason, that makes me sad. Normally I’d pay good money for the people around me to shut up for a few minutes. Talking about their offspring or last night at the pub. Reminiscing about glory days never to be seen again. It’s like if they don’t have attention paid to their insignificant little lives, they’d cease to exist all together. Like most things, now that I’ve got what I wanted, what I wanted has changed.

It’s quiet because nobody knows what to say. They don’t know what to say, because there isn’t anything to say. The newspapers have it covered. Tragedy. Terror. Assassination. They only use the word assassination when it’s someone important, but then, that’s exactly what this is. It could not, in fact, be more important.

Yesterday a man brought a gun into a place that he wasn’t meant to. He used the gun, as one would, to end a life. Why he chose to end that life, in the end, I’m afraid we’ll never know. The man is what you’d call, no longer available.

A human life is a miracle that should be cherished. As far as anyone knows, it’s an anomaly, not found anywhere else in the universe. Yet, we go out of our way to ignore that fact every day. We think ourselves more important than those around us. That disregard, for another human being with a different point of view is all it took. And now, our king is dead.

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Dream – Raven

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I remember the waves as they broke along the rocky shore. The sting of the spray and the taste of salt on the cool breeze. The sun just a muted orb nearing the horizon against a sky of grey slate. It was like watching a muted television, but at the same time being inside the picture.

I stood as naked as the day I was born, keeping my delicate bits covered with my hands. Apparently, I’m self-conscious, even in dreams. My toes dug in the sand and the grit worked itself deep in between.

A weight occupied the back of my mind. Like something needed to be said, but I wasn’t the one with the idea. It fought to break through as the waves in front of me slowed until they froze. Fine mist hung in the air, and sea foam strung the length of the shore like dreary cotton candy.

Movement above me caught my attention. A raven circled in a tight, lumbering arc. At what altitude it was impossible to say. It almost seemed I could reach out and hold it in my hand, but at the same time it grazed the stratosphere and would eclipse a jumbo jet.

The sensation in my skull became urgent, frantic even. I caught a glint in the raven’s eye. It focused on me as it made one final lap, then set a course toward the open sea. The pressure in my head eased, and then along with the raven, it disappeared.

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Photo by sajjad aslani on Unsplash

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