[b][i]—— Earth-F67X: North Capital City, Chinatown[/i][/b]

Mateo flung himself off his mattress. A plastifoam container crunched under foot, empty, wrapper torn. He kicked it, an aluminum [i]Aquafinka[/i] can, and a half-empty bottle of [i]ÜberSilk[/i] party lubricant. Necessities for young men gone feral. After a bit of a shuffle, a patch of filthy green acrylic carpet. Maggots, maybe. He'd spray again, soon.

[i]"Seen my trunks, Kost?"[/i]

[i]"Might've used 'em as a jizz rag,"[/i] Kostas yawned in his bunk to a telltale syncopated fist pump.

[i]"Nasty. Abso vile,"[/i] Mateo sneered, [i]"Wait til I'm out of the van, at least."[/i]

[i]"Bro, all the time you tap my skeet feed and beat to the rhythm. Mmmph. Yeah,"[/i] Kostas' laugh slowed to a husky sigh, [i]"Or what about that time you nightfreaked, jumped my bunk."[/i]

Trunks were under a recycoseal bag, full given Kostas and he were too broke to afford drop service. The bag, that is. As for his trunks, Mateo picked them up and examined them under black light. Clean, mostly. He risked a sniff, smelled only his own ass. Weird, but a locus or else deck Kostas for reanimating dead memories. Again. Dread dream or [i]gApsmAck[/i] hacksoft glitch, no matter, he was out of his mind and craved comfort. Kostas was warm arms, a weight blanket. Mateo's tears dried and cold sweat turned hot, nature's lube.

[i]"You're a liar, too."[/i]

[i]"Check inside."[/i]

Didn't bother. Pulled them on, hassled getting the waistband over his dumpster; mother nature's gift, great for Little League, now a curse. Priests wanted it. Kostas wanted it … again. Trunks always seemed to catch, lift his shelf, then snap and smack his spine while his cheeks clapped. Swim trunks in lieu of shorts and briefs were simpler, anyway; fewer garments to purchase, hold on to, wash. They were also waterproof, soilproof, with a neat neon red flecktarn pattern that matched his socks. A possession from age 12 onward, they sparked joy.

Kostas was just another name on his list. Two down, a bunch to go.

[i]"Gotta be somewhere,"[/i] Mateo exchanged the hotbox van for the covered alleyways of North Capitol City's Kips Bay enclave, the gutter-valve heartbeat of what everyone called New New York. No breeze, but still cooler than a MercSadé hiding two male horndogs pumping chud.

A walk, solitary, long, Mateo a skinny sheen on a silhouette in a dark grotto with old pavers, older foundation blocks. Indirect incandescence, people merely shades, outlines, snakes in water. His moon shone in Heaven as an ad-stream of eternal ultra-vibrant diode manipulation, one moment scarlet, then ultramarine, then harlequin, and always he its penumbra, undulating, coruscating, an ugly cross-hatch curve. A partial outline. Less than a person. Real, the way society felt he was real.

Mateo tucked his thumbs in his trunks and wrinkled his nose. Grease. Food truck, maybe; no, grittier, but nobody around, much less a mobile diner. El overpass, above, abandoned. Flanked by windowless, doorless, boarded-up walls. The utterdark, where even Heaven's light didn't flow. Above the el, an impenetrable crisscross of pedestrian and highway trestles. Quiet. Too quiet. Thumbs down, his trunk legs drooped midway on his knees to the thick of his calves. Sprung, he pissed. All the world a gutter, his gutter. Eyes traced urine through pavers, to crumbled sideway. A lump, trenched up, big.

An hour later, he heaved a corpse through an old Salvation Army warehouse freight door, the kind where you pull a big strap and it lifts on pulleys. Rows of lights buzzed, long tubes that flickered just outside his scotoma, an inducement to a migraine. Concrete blocks painted red, white, pealed, chipped. Corrugated tin or aluminum rather than windows. All that just the husk. Its ribs, rows of folding tables bowed under fabric, limbs, shoes, jewelry. In the center, the crown jewel: a heavy duty piece of cutter tech that could do all the sewing, slicing, dicing, and modding its operator imagined.

[i]"You in, Fesyen?"[/i] Mateo's words echoed.

Hantu Fesyen lifted his head dreamily off his cutter station's desk, [i]"Ah, poor Mateo boy, here to sweet talk himself into some wares? I've told you, I only accept crypto."[/i]

[i]"Pfft, what, too good for trade?"[/i] Mateo shot back, nonchalant. He sat on his tarp-trapped barter, ankle to knee, and inspected his nails. Dirty. Time for another plunge in the Hudson. 

Somewhere in a lilac and green hydrangea explosion that approximated hair, opera glasses folded out and over Hantu's eyes; hammered palladium frames, rose gold arabesques, hexagonal rose lenses. Leisurely, he stood, smoothed out his trans-linen frock coat around his brief, thin figure; vaguely opaque eggshell embroidered in hues of lilac, silver, then emerald in hydro-thread needlepoint that rippled in an arrangement that complemented the arabesques in his frames. A translucent fingernail, synced to his trench's hue shifts, pressed his brown cheek and Fesyen crooned insincerely, [i]"Don't da~are bemuse me, Mateo boye~e. What bi~ig thing are you hiding from du~addy?"[/i]

Mateo stepped forward, but Fesyen held up his hand.

[i]"Stay, Filth!"[/i] screeched Fesyen, [i]"You'll pollute the product!"[/i]

Coattails billowed in his descent as he scampered down the platform.