Demitri sat at his desk, hemming and hawing over what he had decided to write. Ira had requested correspondence after all. In desperation he glanced over at Dinah who lay curled up on the arm of his reading chair, snoozing without a care in the world. He had been thinking over what to write for a couple of days, but as it was coming upon the day that he would exchange the books he lent, he had to buckle down and write the thing.
It was Sunday, and while he didn't observe in person religious practices as others might on this, their one day off, he tried to keep himself busy. He had thrown around the idea of asking Nicolaus for advice. He cringed as he pictured Nicolaus' hearty guffaw and slap on the back for having a "pen pal girlfriend". And while he did have the thought to ask Vlasta, he had to admit, as hospitable as she could be with him, he didn't exactly feel comfortable opening up to her about such a personal matter.
By the time noon had come around, he had spent all morning at his writing desk and he had but one measly paragraph to show for it. His stomach growled and he groaned in frustration as he went to fix himself a meager meal and take a break. He struck a match and turned the knob on his three burner beat up enamel gas stove until there was that routine nervous pause, before the click click click as he timidly brought the match in proximity to the burner causing it to flare and he quickly pulled his hand away and he adjusted the knob accordingly.
He sighed with relief, as he always hated the anticipation of that process. That little pause allowed just enough anxiety to well up in his mind, causing his chest to tighten over his fear that this was going to be the day the faulty patchwork gas stove his landlord refused to fix was finally going to turn out to have some horrible gas leak problem and explode and take him and Dinah with it. He shook off his nerves. Not so bad. Just fearing for my life every time I try to cook something, that's all, he thought to himself tiredly, as he retrieved the eggs and bacon from the ice box and prepared his seasoned cast iron skillet.
All the while he was fixing this meal, the scent had lured Dinah out of her peaceful slumber. She sauntered on into the kitchenette area lazily, hopping up on the counter she wasn't supposed to be on, as she oversaw his work. As the bacon sizzled in the pan, Demitri looked over the newspaper he had grabbed from his small table, and scoured it for his favorite thing.
His face lit up as he came upon an idea. "That's just the thing, Dinah!" he spoke to her, choosing to overlook her transgression upon the counter. "I'm going to eat, and I'm going to go down to the docks for the scavengers market!" He smiled to himself. "I think it'll help me clear my head," He said as he dumped the contents of his skillet onto his plate, still littered with a few crumbs of toast from breakfast, but he paid that no mind.
He ate quickly and gave a glance to the letter that sat on his desk, before putting on his jacket and heading out into town.
The day was mildly gray, but he didn't mind. There weren't a ton of people on the street in the artisan district, but as he got past the smaller streets and onto the main thoroughfare there were significantly more people. Not everyone observed Sunday as a holy day, and many went about their business as did he. There were even more numerous people as he got closer to port. Small crowds created clusters around the boardwalk and in the center there was a long strip where many set up stalls and blankets full up of wares and trinkets alike.
Not every stall was run by scavengers. Rather, today happened to be a day where many scavenging ships were to dock and bring their cargo to port. And when scavenging ships came to town, there was usually a significant boom in commerce as many storekeepers, merchants, artisans, and businesspeople sought to get first pick of the latest finds before they were gone.
Old world relics and resources were prized. The raw materials brought up from the wastes below were essential to making the entire Empire function. Any ore, metal, rock, or minerals had to be brought up by only those brave and foolhearty souls that dared to chance their lives down in the wastes. Old world wood was especially rare. There were some lumber forests in Augrora, but they were limited as to what breeds of trees were hardy enough and efficient enough to grow fast and be worth the space to maintain. Many artisans jumped at the chance to get their hands on quality woods that could be processed and made into the most elegant furniture and things for elites that could be sold at hefty profits.
There was a lot to be said for the day market where most of the industrial and artisanal resource trading was done in broad daylight under the watchful eye of constables and regulators. The night market, however, was where the most interesting items could be found. The night market was far more secretive as it moved about without nearly as much regulation as the day market. There were whispers that the constables and regulatory bodies were just as aware of the dealings there, as they were in the day, but due to the right people making the right amount of profit, it almost always was able to come about unimpeded. It would always follow the day market, but to keep things under the table, the location of the segment on which it would take place would change every time.
Lochshore existed as a massive united structure, but it was made up of many different pieces that were built to be able to be released from their place embedded in the structure, and moved and reattached relatively simply. If you went several layers below the city built on top of itself in places. Down in this underbelly it was harder to keep track of things. The urban layout could become very dense in places. Riddled with miles of bending pipes and maintenance tunnels forming a three dimensional structure that one would need a guide to learn how to navigate the lower most levels. Some would get so complex people could get lost or disappear. But the upper few of these low levels were made home to some of the least fortunate of the lot. Those that were homeless or slaves of the night. With the constant movement of these segments it made it hard for constables to track down individuals who dwelt down in these parts.
The catch was, these areas were dangerous as they tended to be lawless. If you disappeared down there, nobody was coming to find you. But if you were desperate enough to go down, it was unlikely there was anyone coming to look for you in the first place.
The night market often would be set up in different sections of these copper innards of Lochshore. You would go to the day market, and you would go see the person you know, that keeps their ears open. They would tell you the level, the segment number, and roughly you could find the place if you were placed in the right direction.
Demitri had made an unconventional friend some years ago. He wouldn't say he was a criminal by any means, in fact he was a rather amicable and friendly fellow. Just a tad, odd, in candor and countenance, and whether by choice or necessity, he was a vagabond of sorts. He hitched rides and made his home wherever he roamed and did as he pleased.
Every time the Scavenger's Market came to town, Demitri knew exactly who to go see, who could always take him safely down to the night market.
Sweepy Joe.
Sweepy Joe was a fairly notable character amongst the poorer areas of Lochshore. Or rather, if you were a frequenter of the Night Market, there was a strong chance you might see him in the crowd. To be completely blunt, he could be described as an oddball hobo. A scruffy man estimated to be in his 50's or 60's, rumored to be a chimney sweep by trade, given the fact he was notable for wearing his soot-caked jacket that might have been some sort of dignified military uniform at one point in its lifespan as a garment. Whether that means he was in the army at one point, who's to say. He also sported a beat up old crushed felt top hat that had clearly been battered, bent, gnawed on, sat on, and covered in who knows what. He was proudly unashamed of sifting through garbage for what he calls, "The good stuff," A, one man's trash is another man's treasure, sort of mentality that did little to bother Demitri.
One other particular attribute worthy of note was his hands. Beyond the expected attributes on the hands of a man of his age and vocation; i.e. Calluses, a thorough farmer's tan and rough leathery skin, he was born with a form of Ectrodactyly; also known as split hand, or cleft hand syndrome. Ectrodactyly is a type of congenital hand difference, meaning it's present at birth. With this type of hand deformity, the middle part of a baby's hand develops abnormally. They're missing one or more of the central fingers of their hand, leaving a V-shaped space or indentation (cleft). Their hands may have a claw-like appearance and their remaining fingers may be webbed.'
Though when it came to Sweepy Joe, his unique hands tended to be an afterthought compared to everything else about the man. It seemed they did very little to impede his ability to do the things he liked to do for the most part. He was known to be gruff and perhaps a little off-kilter, but Demitri had come to consider him a reliable and amicable friend on these excursions. Sweepy Joe had rescued him from some unsavoury characters or dealers far more than once.
Anyone that knew him knew he was no threat, nor a mark. He boldly flaunted his poverty, so it was well known he had nothing anyone might want to rob anyways, and doubly even the most well versed marketeer could get lost easily down there, and so he was valued as a reputable guide to ask for directions. There were few people as versed with the underside of Lochshore as he was, and even fewer that wouldn't use their understanding of the dark seedy tunnels to take advantage of vulnerable newcomers and topsiders seeking out the night market.
One wouldn't say he had power down there, but he was a fixture of the ecosystem of the underside, so generally people paid him no mind, and tended to leave be anyone he might have in his company, (or any of the other common guides for that matter,) as while the night sellers weren't exactly the most upright lot, they didn't want to discourage newer, fuller, pockets from getting familiar with the place either.
Demitri had met the man one night, walking home from a trip to the day market, admiring the old world relics from afar, when a large hooded man began following him. Growing terribly nervous, he tried to lose him by going down into the underground, making every turn he could think of until he was completely lost, having played right into the derelicts hands, until he found himself cornered in an alleyway with his heart beating a thousand miles a minute. The man had pulled out his knife and demanding Demitri release his treasures as well as his pocketbook when the both of them jumped out of their skin as Sweepy Joe flung open the lid to a dumpster he had been inside and came out swinging a broom and slobbering out sailor jargon like a lunatic, causing a scene and the thug to flee out of there like a bat outta hell.
Demitri had stayed frozen, shaking in his boots, before this wackadoo's wild eyes carefully watched the assailant flee far and away into the night, suddenly his wild eyes softened and his demeanor changed into a more relaxed posture as his husky voice as smooth as a gravel pit asked him if he was alright, in a calm easy going breath.
Sweepy Joe helped guide him safely out of the tunnels and back to the surface, and the two became decently acquainted, and after being tempted with one of the biggest underground old world book markets in the empire, he eventually couldn't help himself and took Sweepy Joe up on his offer to guide him there.
Owning and having books from the old world wasn't explicitly prohibited in the Caelumnian Empire, though the selling and distribution of old world books was highly discouraged by the government. To Demitri's recollection there might have even been a law passed awhile back that did something to classify old world books in particular, as "relics" that should be directed toward libraries, or rather, deeply buried in dusty, restricted archives, for their historical protection of course.
Though what that really meant was that everything in them was kept in exclusive archives, if even kept at all, and were made nearly completely inaccessible to the everyday public. Academics could request to see the archives, or if you could pay an outlandish fee, you could see them.
It wasn't strictly noticeable at first glance what books were old world and what was new world outside the publisher page, inside of the book itself, so Demitri tended to be selective with the copies he decided to lend out, and discreet if he read them in public, and so tended to have very few issues regarding this. It was just something he kept in the back of his mind.
He'd always remember his first time buying a book from the night market. It was from the book wizard, another oddball fellow with a wide brimmed pointed hat that greeted him in a rather suspect fashion by beckoning him over, saying something like, Hey! Hey kid! looking around for witnesses before opening his robe, which had stitched in it dozens of envelope-like pockets that were full of authentic old world brochures, post cards, catalogues, magazines, diaries, maps, and the like, and he said, you wanna buy a book?
And Demitri did. He did, very much, wanna buy a book. That was his first hit, some kind of pocket atlas of the old world; something like a handful of simplistic old world maps that sparked such a ravenous curiosity, and after that he couldn't help but come back for more! He was hooked on the stuff! It felt like some secret undercover project. It made him feel all cozy and excited watching his bookshelf expand and his private library extend with special archaic tomes he was the sole keeper of.
Perhaps the only versions of their kind left in the whole wide world, he had thought to himself sometimes. It made him feel special, and it was stimulating to decipher and decrypt the archaic but still understandable slang and terminology. Even more than that, it made him think. The stories had lessons in them that stuck with him. The science books illustrated so much of what we used to know, pictures of how the world used to look, places that no longer exist, history books with palaces that no longer have a name.
He felt silly for thinking such things, surely there must be some greater archive out there in some of the bigger libraries, where everything about the old world was catalogued laboriously by studious scribes dedicated to their craft. There was no way his silly day dreams of self importance meant much of anything outside of himself. Even so, he couldn't help but feel important for cataloguing and protecting these incredible finds. There were probably a million of these in some archive somewhere he often thought. But what if there weren't? What could we be losing that the government doesn't deem it profitable to be worth saving? Or rather, worth making accessible to the masses. Or even more worrisome, what are they afraid they were going to learn?
Whenever his thought spirals got that dire, he would always try and shake it off and not think about it too much. He was just a silly little collector, no big deal. He was a silly little man, with a silly little hobby, that he religiously alphabetized, repaired, maintained, and even handcrafted an entire index for in a nice little frame by his bookcase. He was nothing special, and it would probably be appreciated by nobody other than just him, alone, in his run down apartment, living with his cat… But, Ira liked them. He smiled to himself, thinking about perhaps there was someone out there that got as much out of his silly little books as he did.
"Err-! Watch your step youngin'!" Sweepy Joe's gruff old voice puffed as he grabbed the back of Demitri's collar, snapping him out of his daydream and suddenly he winced as his heart sunk. He glanced down and saw he was just about to walk off the platform of the segment tunnel they had been walking down. The rusty industrial grate staircase had ended a few steps back and they were supposed to take a sharp turn to the right to continue on the path, but straight ahead with not even a guardrail or a warning sign to impede him, he was nearly going to be lost to the inky void below them, echoing with churning faraway gearworks and echoing metallic bangs from far off in the deep.
"Ya nearly walked off the edge! And where would I get mah beans from then lad? By the way, ya did bring mah beans didn't ye?" he winked at him, raising a furry caterpillar of an eyebrow examining his ward with his bloodshot but capable eye. Demitri took a moment, preventing his heartbeat from reaching the stratosphere from nearly dying horrifically in an instant.
"Y-yeah!" He exhaled with a shaky breath, and opened up his satchel, revealing the cans of beans he had brought with him. "You know I can bring you things other than beans, right?" He reminded the older man sympathetically. As he was far from stingy when it came to sharing things as basic as food and freshwater.
"And Beer!" The grubby old man peered into the bag with a yellow toothed grin, spotting the brew he had been looking forward to. "And don't you knock the beans, lad! You best be eatin' yer fill of em yourself! Them's got the right stuff to keep ya going even during the hard times! And a-course I still live for me luxuries too! A brew or two never hurt nobody, you oughta try it. Kid so young, yer liver's just beggin fer a beatin'!" He grinned as he poked Demitri's belly then continued to walk. Demitri just sighed and rolled his eyes as he followed his elder obediently.
He tried to focus more on the path before them, and to focus on the here and now. He set his sight on the man before him. He'd been meeting with him for a while now, and come to think of it, he never learned much about the old man. Well, outside what sounded like tall tales and balderdash. Still he decided to take a chance and sate his curiosity.
"So, Joe," The young man broke the quiet between them. "How is it you came to know these tunnels so well? Did you get lost and end up just staying down here?"
The elder man leading the charge with a bold bounce in his step seemed to slow upon hearing this, he looked back at the boy incredulously, then shook his head as he muttered something under his breath as their walk nearly came to a halt. Demitri suddenly shrunk into himself slightly and felt his cheeks get hot, burning with sudden regret at asking the question. Still they kept walking and he decided he wasn't going to pry any further unprompted. In a few more steps they could finally hear the distant cacophony of the night market in full swing, loud as a convention echoing against all the rusty metallic passages getting closer and closer.
Sweepy Joe had his head bowed as if thoughts were pulling his attention himself, hesitating before finally spinning around and telling the kid to his face.
"Ya never heard of the Ugly Laws, have ya, Lark?" He asked Demitri plainly. Demitri raised his eyebrows in surprise at the sudden reply, before shaking his head, surprised. The old man furrowed his thick furry eyebrows that nearly hid his small, bright eyes, as he rested a bifurcated hand on his shoulder.
"Ya see, when I was young, younger than ya'r now, we had these called the Ugly Laws," He scratched his matted head of messy hair with his other hand, tilting his hat forward in the process. "Folks like meself, well, we weren't to be seen out in the open like the pretty folk who make the rules. As ya can pry tell that makes it awful hard to earn an honest livin' in the world," the old sailor grumbled out in a matter of fact manner. "Themfolk decided people who're born diffrn't, with bodies they seen as twisted and out of sorts, we were deemed obscene and well, we could get rounded up and sent away or jailed for just goin' about our business in public durin' the daylight hours," He shrugged. "Scared I might make the ladies faint, given I'm so handsome ya see," He guffawed and nudged the boy in the ribs with his elbow, his grin showing off his missing tooth.
"Gosh, that's just… that's just awful," Demitri looked skeptical before the man's serious tone fully set in. "That just isn't fair-!" He began to object before his elder raised a hand to his objection.
"Eh, world ain't fair." He shrugged. "I never let it bother me none. I made my way and Ol' Joe's doin' just fine as he ever was. I learned me trades and such in the places I was able, and eventually found meself down here, with lots of other sorts far worse off than I. There's plenty that make their buck at the market if you look! Plenty of em are far freer than yer average topsider, not havin to lick the boots of the man just to get by, you know, like you lad," He patted his head, shaking his head, pitying the boy. Demitri donned a slightly puzzled look and tried to not feel insulted by what the man just said before he just continued to listen.
"I feel worst for the folk like me that take it too personal, aye," He shook his head reproachfully. "It's hardest on the younger ones that take it to heart, might even believe it that they're some freaks who don't belong," The scruffy old man kept on waxing philosophical, putting an arm around Demitri's shoulder as he made his impassioned soapbox speech. "But we are freaks that do belong and I ain't never asked for nobody's permission, no-sir!" Demitri cringed at the uninvited encroachment on his personal space bubble, but hated to interrupt the geezer's fine soliloquy. "I jes pick what I wanna do and I do it! That's all there is to it! And just be too slippery for the law to catch ya is all!"
"It's folk like you I really feel bad for," He shook his head again and Demitri, finally finding the wherewithal to wiggle out of his overly-affectionate elder's grasp, asked.
"Wait, why feel bad for me? I don't have to live underground like you do, I'm just fine! I fit in just about anywhere and can do whatever I want to do!" Demitri finally asked in an impertinent manner.
The old man's eye twinkled with a knowing glance and smiled in a kind, humble fashion, closing his eyes and sighing.
"Aye, ya really think that, don' cha lad?" He smirked and cracked open one of the beers Demitri didn't even realize he had snagged from his bag while he had his arm around him.
"The older I get, I seen plenty of the oddies like me get bitter and resentful that they were born diffrn't, heck there was even a time I mighta said some of the same," He twisted the cap off with his teeth and spat it out and took a refreshing drink before wiping the spit off his lip and the foam out of his beard with a satisfied smile. "Naw, these days I reckon it was prolly one o' the best things that coulda happened to me. There was no chance of me fittin' in topside. But I wouldn't a belonged up there anyway, with that buggerin' rat race, work all day till your bones give out just to crawl back home to yer shithouse and do it all o'er again," He shook his head and took another drink. "I learned to live outside all that. Got the chance to get away from all that judgement and hogwarsh they teach ya ta give a damn about. Who's got what and how much." He blew out his lips, exasperatedly before pointing at his companion. "These hands are a gift ya see!" He held up his claw-like hand suddenly to Demitri's face, just a couple centimeters shy of his nose, causing him to flinch.
"I can tell what kinda people someone is, right out. If they're callin' me a scrubby mutant tramp, then fuck em!" He shrugged with his hands in the air and laughed heartily with genuine warmth in his voice. "That just tells me they don't care about knowin nothin' about who I actually am, so why the hell should I care how someone that small sizes me up?" He reached in the satchel again and dug out a beer and he held it out toward Demitri. "I knew what kind you are right away,"
Demitri laughed nervously and waved away the beer. "I don't drink, but thank you," The old man shrugged and continued on.
"You're a grateful fella with a firm handshake is what ya are!" He grinned and nudged the spectacled man in the ribs with his elbow before sliding the spare beer in his inside jacket pocket. "Just a little too quiet and a little too comfortable is all. But don't you worry. Yer gonna find yer own way outta that rat cage, and finally start livin' soon enough," He cackled and took another drink.
"I appreciate the concern, but really I'm just fine," Demitri said insistantly.
"Naw, if you were just fine, why would you be runnin' around down here? If that life up there suited ya perfect, why ya find yerself hungry for the underground? Rubbin' elbows with us folks they told ya to be scared of? Searchin' for that somethin' they told ya not to poke yer nose into?? I tell ya boy, there's more you want outta life, you just need to find yerself some courage is all," He grinned and wiped his mouth before patting him on the back.
"Huh… More outta life…" Demitri paused and thought to himself for a moment before Sweepy Joe poked him with a hard jab in the shoulder.
"And lookie here kiddo we made it! Thar she blows right now!" He beamed and Demitri looked up and his eyes shined with anticipation.
There was a great winding hall with support beams and oodles of all kinds of people in all directions going about from different stalls in a great convention as many curious characters displayed their wares on tables and blankets on the ground and all about, the air buzzing with commerce and conversation. The energy in the air was electric, partially due to the hum of the neon and halogen lamps that buzzed all throughout.
Demitri's fingers tingled with anticipation and his heart leapt with excitement. His grizzled guide laughed at his companions' repeated excitement and met him with the same ramshackle energy of grandeur.
"Here we are boy!" He beamed. "The Night Market!"