Posting this is gonna get me killed.
I knew a long life was never on the cards for me. Not where I grew up.
But you gotta do what you gotta do. That’s what I’ve always done.
When I was 4 my mam smoked so much crack she thought she was an angel and leapt to her death from the top of our tenement roof, and dad…well…what fucking dad lol.
It’s been just me ever since and I’ve learned every lesson since then the hard way. But I’ve got by…By any means necessary.
School wasn’t an option so I just got to work making money. With no qualifications I had to get creative. I started out with pickpocketing and shoplifting and then graduated to some of the ballsier stuff. Bribing, extorting, GTA…make no mistake, I’m not the hero of this story…but like I say, you gotta do what you’ve gotta do. Believe me.
I’ve robbed pregnant women at gunpoint, slipped envelopes stuffed with powder into backpackers gear and shoved tightly wrapped parcels up my asshole. I once let a guy beat himself off while I flexed for him just for dinner money.
The world aint good and I thought I’d seen the worst of it, but I shoulda known. It can always get darker.
My work ethic got me noticed in all the wrong places. I became known as some one who would do any odd job that needed doing if the price was right. And people liked me cos I didn’t ask questions.
Where I’m from, curiosity kills the cat.
But after this evening…it seems the opposite might be true as well.
Turns out where I’m from…you’re just straight fucked.
It was one week ago that the sweaty bald dude in his tidy white suit found me.
I don’t know how he sniffed me out. I was drinking in some dive that I hadn’t even planned to end up when he poured himself into my booth.
“I’ve heard you’re a boy that likes money?” he wheezed in a voice so deep it made my bones hurt. The bastard started sipping from my beer, his stomach pushed right up against table and his swollen face stuck in a nasty grimace. Like a shark in a suit.
“My friends and I would very much like to pay you in exchange for some simple services. You’re not scared of a little bit of water are you?”
I already didn’t like the sound of it. Not cos of the water, I wasn’t scared of water then, but cos it was already too complicated. Simple jobs for simple money was how I got by: Take A to B. Meet A and do B. Take A from B.
“Next Monday we need you to make your to Hastur bridge for 11pm. A nice little boy of mine will be waiting for you with a…” He paused and wet his lips with his short white tongue “Vehicle. A submersible kind of vehicle. It’s home made and reasonably safe.”
“Reasonably?”
“Yes fucking reasonably.” The bastard snarled “I wouldn’t fancy it myself, but that’s why we’re paying you.” Couldn’t blame him for being straight up with the truth. Wouldn’t be the first time a stranger wanted to put me in harms way…and that was fine by me. At the end of the day it usually meant a bigger stack.
“You’ll drive the vehicle along the river bed. Best way to avoid prying eyes and night patrols. You’ll take it down to the mouth of the river and then bring it into dock in a system of small caves that we’ve been utilising.” The shark finished my beer with a satisfied smacking of his rubbery lips.
My boy will make sure you’re as comfortable as possible in our contraption…there’ll be a small team in the cave waiting for your delivery around midnight. There will be 30 white packages on the sub with you and 30 white packages are what they’ll be expecting.” The man leaned forwards as he emphasized these words, the table groaning beneath his darkened face.
“Bring these packages to the meeting point, discreetly, untouched, and we’ll pay you the princely sum of $6,000.”
I tried not to make a face. I tried not to show anything at all and the bastard laughed.
“Yes not bad for a nights work is it. Let’s see how you take to the sub, but if you’re work is satisfactory then there will be…more regular deliveries to follow. ”
$6,000 was better than ‘not bad’, it was unheard of. The unspoken truth of every job was that whatever you pay the runner reflects what you’re delivering…maybe the cost of the product, or maybe the risk involved in the run…$6,000 should have warned me. It shoulda been a red flag.
Next Monday rolled around and at 11pm I made my way to one of cities less loved bridges. A skinny boy on a bike was hovering roadside and gave me a knowing nod. The kid ditched his bike and then led me to the underside of the bridge.
It was dark and smelt like piss and I didn’t like that I hadn’t seen his face. I didn’t like that the echo of the bridge made it sound like he had 100 hundred voices.
“Hope you’re good with small spaces” he laughed and it sounded like a crowd. The kid crouched down to the water level and then lifted a thick length of roped towards me.
Attached to the other end was a small metal coffin.
“This is the sub…you’ll need to lie flat on your stomach when you get in. the controller is right in front of you…it’s an xbox controller which I assume you’re good with.”
“Sure” I lied…as if I’d ever had a fucking xbox.
“Once you’re in I’m gonna need to seal it up with bolts and stuff so it’s completely airtight. Just get yourself to the meeting point and they’ll cut you out the other side…I’ll give you 3 knocks when you’re good to go and then you’re gonna want to get a move on…there’s a tank of oxygen but…” the boy shrugged and never finished the thought.
“Oh and you’re gonna want to take that off” The boy pointed but in the dark I couldn’t see what he was pointing at.
“My top?” I asked suspiciously, trying to work out if this was all a laugh at my expense.
“All of it. It’s hot in there…you’re gonna sweat. Right let’s get started…they’re expecting you.”
Too proud? Too stupid? Too desperate? All of the above. I thought about that $6,000 and got on with it.
I stripped off and clambered down into the small metal torpedo. The boy was right, from the first moment I climbed in I noticed how warm it was and how much worse it would become once he sealed me in. The only light came from a small screen that was charting the course, bathing the miniscule space in deep red light.
There was something…womblike about it.
To the left and right of me, down each side of the vehicle were the white bags…if I’d been thinking straight I’d have counted them to make sure I wasn’t being duped. They lined the cabin like ballast.
The boy kneeled down above me, closer than I’d have liked to my exposed ass. “I’m closing you in now. Good luck. Just make the drop and leave alright? Don’t speak to them. Just take the money and don’t think about it again. They’ll show you how to leave when they’re satisfied.”
Then the kid shut me in. No more time for questions. I heard drilling outside and the walls around me shook. The vehicle was held together with nothing more than a few sheets of flimsy metal and now the clock was ticking on my air supply. It dawned on me how much I was risking for this stack.
3 knocks and it was time to go.
I thumbed the controller and the sub lurch forwards and began whirring loudly as it’s propellers activated. Just when I thought I was getting the hang of it I heard a heavy thump beneath me and realised I’d found the bottom. The metal beneath me bulged and stayed dented and as we bounced away I realised that this sub could only take 1 or 2 more knocks like that before it came apart at the seams and that would be the end of my shitty little life.
I tried to push down the fear and concentrate on getting my breathing right. There wasn’t enough oxygen for me to panic and my entire body was already glistening with sweat.
The journey was half an hour but it felt like half my life.
Soon enough I saw the geography on the radar start to change and could see the little inlet that was the designated drop off place. I’d got my head around the controls a little better and slowly brought the sub into the cave system and began to rise.
I felt a strange weightless bob and realised I’d broken the surface. Nothing happened.
“Hello?” I yelled, my voice sounding dead in the confined space.
If I’d fucked up and got the wrong cave or there was no one here to meet me then I was dead. I’d bake and suffocate in this small metal box.
Then shuffling and tapping outside and I finally breathed a small sigh of relief. The metal began to quake again and the roof above me peeled away. I was blinded by the light of several torches.
I stood up and staggered out of the craft, comforted by the feeling of land beneath my feet again. The torches continued to roam my naked body and beyond them I could see tall black outlines.
“Step back” a few voices rasped, some how all speaking together. I tried to shield my eyes as I stumbled away, peering to see who I was dealing with.
I could see their shapes crouched above the sub, reaching in and gathering up the bags and then passing them, one to another in a human chain, but something seemed wrong about their arms…the length of them.
“It’s all here” the many voices said again. “He’s a good boy”
“Good boy”
“Good boy”
“Good boy”
The voices fractured for a moment repeating these words endlessly and I couldn’t tell if I was surrounded by a hundred figures or if it was an echo.
“Reach out your right arm and stroke the wall by your side. Walk forward and never leave the wall. You’ll find your way back to the surface soon enough. Your money is waiting for you.” The voices spoke as one again and suddenly I felt very cold and very alone.
“Tell no one about this. You’ll hear from us again. Such a good boy”
Again the chorus of voices echoed my praise and I decided it was time to get the fuck out of there.
I reached out until my hand came into contact with the mossy stone wall and I began blindly stumbling forwards. Behind me the echoes died away into a ripping sound as the strangers tore into the packages.
Again this should have set alarm bells ringing…you never fuck with your own supply and here they were, immediately sucking, slurping, and snorting whatever contraband I’d just brought them.
An unseen snag in the rock ripped off one of my finger nails but I did stop. I didn’t want to know what they were doing.
Then I tripped.
Below my feet was one of the white bags, torn open and the illicit contraband spilled out around me. The bag was filled with limbs…little human limbs, the type that belong to little street rats like me who no one would ever miss if they disappeared.
I glanced back…I couldn’t help myself.
The figures were still gorging themselves on the contents of the bags and now they were rising up off the floor. The shapes all seemed to be connected to one another and connected to the mossy walls of the caves. Up they went, up and away into the darkness, feeding on the goods that I had brought them until they were gone.
Part of the caves once more.
Part of this land that eats the poor.
I ran and ran and ran and ran until I finally felt fresh air and found myself out beneath the night sky.
In the distance I could see the city and realised this was the first time in my life that I’d left it. There was more in this world than I could possibly imagine…the good and the bad.
I promised myself then that I wouldn’t go back. Couldn’t ever go back. Because you’ve got to do whatever it takes to survive in this world, and there’s no future for people like me in that city.
We’re just meat.
So this is my warning to all of you…that these people are out there.
Posting this is gonna get me killed.
But you gotta do what you gotta do.