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789 checks

Dust motes hang in the stale air. Unbound stars drifting in space.

From the window you can hear the sound of two people laughing out on Orphanage Street.

The skin -- clammy, coarse.

Above you, the last visible stars dissolve in the dawn-light. Elsewhere, the bark of a small dog muffled by a window.

A shame. A good weather report's harder to produce than it looks.

Above you, uncountable stars veiled by the scattering of blue light. Elsewhere, the bark of a small dog muffled by a window.

Above you, the evening's first stars blink into life. Elsewhere, the bark of a small dog muffled by a window.

Above you, a canyon of stars, framed by the buildings of the Housing Campaign. Elsewhere, the bark of a small dog muffled by a window.

Gentle electronic tones rise and recede from it like the tide against a digital beach.

Suprema 100. Like the ones your double brought.

Suprema 100. Smoked by tens of millions across the People's Republics.

But no one jumps out of anything. No one appears to fix your hair or tell you exactly what to say. It's just you, the man with the box for a heart, and a few metres off, the maintenance man going about his lonely offices.

You haven't yet emerged from the fog of sodium thiopental. There's no deflecting just now.

Comically vague. Very little to work with.

Through the television screen, his eyes meet yours.

Out of the corner of your eye, on one of the little rounded tables, you notice someone's left an old sausage, casing black and blistered, pool of grease congealing around it.

The vendor sighs and seems to deflate ever so slightly before your eyes.

Nostrils flare like hairy little cannons.

Veins rise like old roots beneath his thin skin.

Whispered, urgent, seething.

Little bits of foam stick to it, and there are broken pieces at the side. She's torn it from something else.

She flaps her hands around inside them to demonstrate volume.

A light pink flush on her cheeks.

Anything. You can't feel anything.

She touches a hand to the wounds on her chest.

She shoots you a quick glance, trying to read your expression.

It's not climbing fast, but it is climbing.

One of the thinner tendrils reflexively lifts as you nudge it.

Warm cottage cheese dragged through battery acid.

Damp. Slightly raised. Almost fuzzy, like it's sweating.

Lopsided, only one half of his mouth lifts to bare his teeth in the sinister smile he gives you.

Fresh blood vessels pop in his eyes.

A labcoat splattered with blood both new and old.

Blood in his gums, too.

Oh, yeah. Feel that heft. This prybar's pried some shit.

The entry wound glows warm, as though awakened.

That's not liquor.

A noose around his neck. A labcoat splattered with blood both new and old.

The lettering on the man's t-shirt, although barely legible, reads: '¡TODOS SOMOS NESTOR!'

She rubs the card between her discerning thumb and forefinger.

The shadows under her eyes deepen. She swallows.

Automatically, your eyes scan up from hers. You notice the lace at the front of her wig.

Dolphins reflected in his eyeglasses.

Her husband clears his throat.

She sends a worried look to the door. Pascal sits beyond.

She pats her left hand dry on the tea towel hanging from the cupboard. There are tiny little daisies on it.

You hear someone laugh, loudly, on the roof above.

'I wish I was deaf.'

His words uncertain, his bearing unsteady. Drunk, possibly high?

Horrific chemical orgasm. A hallucinogenic purge of everything stored within the brain's archives, known to the laywoman as life flashing before your eyes.

789 skill checks - ZERO PARADES field manual - Page 15 of 16