Coordination

"Still waiting, CASCADE. Slab's getting cold."

"Shh."

"Hello again."

You approach your double. A faint line of drool darkens the sheet.

"Loneliest... of towns..."

The container is still overfull with rubbish.

"I told you this place is off-limits. It's been targeted by a gang." He shakes his head.

He ignores you, transfixed by the woman above.

You return to one of the city's ancient benches. It welcomes you.

"Hello, hero."

An assortment of cargo crates sits in waiting, adorned with faint chalk marks and bright yellow labels.

"You're back." She eyes you warily.

He stares straight ahead, trying to ignore PSEUDOPOD. He looks extremely uncomfortable.

The man's eyes are closed. He is completely still.

"I really think you'd dig this. You look like the type."

"Back again, Hershel."

H.S. Lastra's blood-obsessed pulp epic awaits you.

With awkward reverence, you approach the shrine again.

"Operant. Something big is happening, isn't it?"

The magic box hums its secret tune. In a dark Novessa sub-basement, your controller answers.

It all happens in milliseconds. A sharp blow to your elbow, the flashlight flying out of your grasp...

"Hello again." The subeditor smiles at you with the left side of her mouth.

You approach Shelves B and C once more.

A typed page lies upside-down in a stack of similarly formatted files. The cover reads: 'Remote Viewing Testimonial N.28'.

"As I suspected, my sources were very pleased with your work. Well done, Hershel. It's an honour to work with you again."

"Fuck off, Tigerpussy."

The glimmering purple keyboard is just as you left it.

"Yyyes?" Again the heavy, authoritative Azzurri voice comes through.

Look, around your feet.

The ladder beckons.

"Wow... an actual liquidity mage..."

"Goodbye."

The abandoned cardboard moving boxes remain in the corner of the little apartment.

"Here again."

You have already engaged in model train repair and improvised weapon manufacture here. There is nothing else to do at the workbench.

"It's cold out here." The girl rolls her shoulders and lightly stamps a foot.

"Didn't work, did it?"

"Hello, lapinette."

"..." His idiotic expression remains unchanged.

"You. Again." The tapping begins.

The ration pack crinkles as you turn it over.

She will not look at you.

"CASCADE." The barest of nods. "I've been playing 'I Spy' relentlessly with myself to pass the time. Pretty even as things stand, but I'm…

You return to the postbox.

Tiny figures jog across the screen, lobbing the hard pelota ball back and forth.

The clinic's metal door is scabbed with rust and surrounded by graffiti. An official looking sign hangs to the right of it.

"Anything interesting in the shack back there?" He smiles at you.

"You should move, CASCADE."

You crawl back into the tunnel, as far in as you were before, where it starts to shrink.

The fire door stands between you and the roof. Unfortunately, someone removed the pelota ball that was wedging it open.