Empyrean Iris Story Collection Vol. 4

In the Past

Several Years Ago

The town was small and cold with entirely too much open land, simply vast swaths of scruff field that just sat there unutilized for either housing or farmland. The sky was gray and the ground was dusted in a light layer of snow that turned much of the remaining plant life gray or brown. What little city there was didn't amount to much, its tallest buildings reaching no higher than three to four stories give or take a few levels. Ramirez was used to an altogether different caliber of city, the kind where they tend to build up and not out, with multilevel city building blocks that were taller than they were wide and reached higher than the cloud cover. This little two nwas something out of the movies, an old relic of the way things had been done in the past. Single level houses sat on open tracks of land spaced unevenly apart separated only by the soft shimmering of energy fences.

He took a corner following his GPS through the cold morning, glad only for the fact that his car didn't have tires and he didn't have to worry about potential black ice lurking under the surface of the snow, which glazed the pavement with a light dusting, like a powdered doughnut. The neighborhood he entered was small and rundown, populated primarily by cheap rundown houses mass produced on an open market and at least a century behind modern urban planning. Snow still dusted the ground here, browning already scruffy lawns. A few of the houses didn't even have energy fences and were forced to settle for chain link/

A rather miserable looking pitbull barked at his car as he passed by fro behind the chain link, his paws leaving prints in the snow. The neighborhood was mostly quiet, a sad sort of reminder of where life tended to lead some people. The neighborhood seemed tired, just like the few people Ramirez noted peeking through their curtained windows lording over castles of cracking cement and splintering plaster.

It was all rather depressing.

He wasn't sure if this was the right place.

He glanced down at his GPS again.

Your destination is on the right.

He pulled to a stop, examining the little house, squinting as if he could garner some clues as to the truthfulness of the GPS. The house itself was, again, small sandwiched on either side by one energy barrier and one chain link fence. The house on the left was clearly a hoarder's den, with items practically spilling out fo the windows and onto the front lawn, including several old bicycles, a ton of children's play equipment, and a sagging rusted swing in the background that likely hadn't been used for several years if at all, sagging there quietly in the soft morning dusting of snow.

However, this house was relatively well put together.

It was something his mother might have even called homey or cute. There were no cracks in the sidewalk, and the lawn looked like it might have been rather well maintained. The house itself was freshly painted sometime in the last year, and there was no visible unk in the yard.

He shrugged and pulled into the Driveway cutting the near quiet engine, and reaching into the backseat for the basket his mother and abuela had sent him with. Some of it was for his long trip, which had taken well over ten hours, but some of it was for his housewarming gift, "If I know young men." His mother began, "They'll be eating boxed noodles and very few vegetables, so it'll be your job to feed them while you are there." He brought with him some of his mother's cooking in sealed cooling containers, and a boat load of pastries, which had taken him gargantuan effort not to simply eat on the spot. If needed he could make his own, no son of his mother or grandson of his Abuela could manage to grow up without knowing how to properly feed himself, but still there was a high likelihood these poor sods wouldn't have half of the ingredients required.

Including about ninety percent of the spices.

Ramirez stepped softly out of the car, with the basket over one arm and into the blistering cold. A puff of mist rolled out from his nose as the cold stung his cheeks. He shuffled his feet awkwardly in the snow. It had been a while since he had seen his friend, heard about what happened and wasn't sure how to behave.