“You are leaving Selected Safe Sectors, the D-Sector is not considered a Safe Sector. Please be advised, if you do decide to venture into the D-Sector, your safety will be at your own responsibility, and not of Central Systems and Enforcement personal.”
Lolan descends down a single escalator, as she passes through the overhead walkways, and what was once a shopping area in all of its abandonment. Littered with rubbish, and boarded up retail shops covered in graffiti. The escalator continues its decent, Lolan views a disused Magnetized Rail system and its empty platform, the remnants of a thriving metropolis, as an overambitious project created to house a Utopia, where millions of people commuted between its labyrinth of sub-levels. Is now, just a desolate reminder of over planning and corporatism in all of its greed. A broken relic of a societies overconfidence, in the face of its own folly.
“Haven't been down here in such a long time, and I’m slightly tripping from the Hyantialcos pill and the booze, nice offset through. Not too drunk, but calmly, everything feels a little distorted.” She says quietly to herself, as she views a shop front, with one of its mannequins perched over, its head, tweaked to the right, halfway stuck out from what was once a window. Lolan studies its androgynous features, as though it is smiling, staring into nothingness. It looks contented enough. The escalator nears the final Sub-Level, to which a network of walkways and stairs will lead her down to street level.
That scent, so hard to define. Like a sweet metallic smell.
She thinks of her mother, before she was born.
In a calm manner, Lolan reaches into her handbag and takes out a handgun, a specialized gun assigned to elite Police Enforcement and Track and Locate special forces units. Which fires Tungsten, caseless rounds. Designed to take down criminals utilizing retrofitted body armor. The street level areas of the D-Sector are known to harbor criminal gangs who use the Sub-Levels as meeting places, although occasionally patrolled by Enforcement, their presence in the D-Sector is non existent. Nor do close circuit video monitoring systems or surveillance tracking drones operate in these abandoned Sub-Levels. Lolan reaches the final level.
“The old city”
Walking out to the what was once a main thoroughfare, where traffic of yesteryear would have commuted back and forth within the widen street. Walking along a darkened footpath in a westerly direction, admiring the solitude and desolation of the failed urbanization around her. Closing her eyes briefly, as a breeze is felt.
“Hey!...”
Opening her eyes, she sees a man in front of her, dressed in a disheveled way, wearing a cap, she makes out his features of man in his early Forties, with an unkempt brown colored beard, with graying strands of hair throughout.
“...What are you doing?”
Lolan, still holding the handgun in her left hand, calmly moves it behind her, so that it is out of sight of the man in front of her.
“Going for a walk,” she replies, pausing in front of the man, who, in agitated movements walks towards Lolan.
“You know who I am!...” The man says, raising his voice slightly.
“Nope,” Lolan replies, staring at the man.
“...YOU KNOW WHO I AM?…” He yells out loud.
“Shhh, keep your voice down you fucking idiot,” Lolan replies.
“Fuck you bitch, I’m a gang leader…” He starts jumping up and in down in threatening type movements, albeit keeping his distance from Lolan. “...You heard of the Sub-Twenty Threes?…”
Lolan giggles to herself.
“...We’re fucking killers...Fuck, I’m that serial killer you heard about, I kill bitches like you. Cut you to pieces, and I’ll do nasty things to you, you wouldn’t believe…”
“Ok, asswipe. You got two options, One, you fuck off, but I’ll still hurt you. Two, you die. You gotta choose, you disgusting piece of shit.”
“...FUCK YOU! YOU KNOW WHO I AM!” He yells out again, this time brandishing a large knife in his right hand, to which he lunges at Lolan, she quirky lifts her gun and fires off an explosive tipped Tungsten round. Hitting the man directly into his chest, he flies back from the impact of the single shot. Flung towards a windowless shopfront, whilst dropping the knife. Lolan, in a calm manner walks to where the man is lying, eyes wide open, she sees the wound. Fused by the caseless round, yet its impact was devastating. Blowing a large hole through his upper body.
“No, I don’t know who you are. But, you’re dead...” She places the handgun back into her handbag, continuing to walk onward towards the West. “...And one less problem. For a woman who wants to walk alone…” She eyes the empty buildings on either side of the street. “...Even if it is a dangerous place.”
Lolan nears a single building, brutalist in its design as a relic of the last Two Hundred years, yet it seemingly stands alone. A sleek gray exterior, of what was once an old office block, then later a museum. Standing outside the entrance of its large, black metallic foyer doors which are open, she walks inside. They close behind her.
The countless spirits that have passed through this place, all have since been purged. So beautifully empty. She thinks to herself, admiring the slick, yet worn and barren interior of its foyer. Entering an elevator, she presses the number Ninety Eight which is the top floor, the lift doors close, as it ascends. She stands in the dark, unperturbed.

___
Reading: "Previsions of future End" from COVEAL OF THE HEDONIC (A.Glass 2025)

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