It was a nice cold day in the Motor City. Detroit was such a dump he had chosen it on pure impulse as a place to get lost in. Thunderclouds were gathering and a wet November snow was on its way as he half laid half sat on the old cold stone bench on the sidewalk in front of some deserted school. His body had been flashing for days; the key-ring inserted in his wrist tugging and heating up now and again, and now, finally, his guts were beginning to heat up.

Yes, an hour or two at most, and then you are back in the past where you belong.

Four gangbangers had gathered, and were waiting for a fifth who was now approaching. Jay had just tuned them out and pretended to sleep while he listened to them posture, rap and pose. One had a small caliber automatic. They were of no account to him. The call was coming and all he cared about was going. He had lived for three months now in the post-apocalyptic world that millions of people who did not realize that they were already dead, thought of as 21st Century America: a culture he despised; a nation he hated; and a life he could barely endure without lashing out and piling up the enemy…

Speaking of the enemy, here comes the war-chief. His lieutenant with the gun doesn’t have the balls to cap you.

He opened his eyes and looked up into the boy who had just arrived. His lieutenant was handing him the auto. They had spoken of this boy by his actual name, Tavon. He did not go by some phony gang-banger handle like the rest. He was the only actual person there before him. The others were already ghosts to Jay Bracken, who had made ghosts of hundreds of men in his various blood-drenched trips into the past.

You know, I bet he tastes good.

Tavon then took the .25 auto and leveled it at Jay’s chest as his lieutenant reached over and undid the safety. The boy then spoke in terms that gangbangers must often think in but actually pronounced everything as if he could read; like he was actually smart, “Look Mister, give it up. Give it all up and maybe I won’t bust a cap in your White ass.”

The others chimed in, “Yeah, give it up yo.”

Eat him alive! You soaked up a whole clip of .25 shorts in that beaner meth-lab.

He stood up and body-typed the hood-rats all in one easy motion.

It’s all getting burned off of you in the event anyhow. Just give it away.

He reached down and undid his brushed leather boots and handed them to the kid wearing size ten Nike’s. “They ought’a fit ye dude.”

He chucked his smelly old socks aside with his right as he removed his green George’s Food Market hat and placed it on Tavon’s head. The boy had forgotten his own hat.

Their eyes are all bugging out looking at those cougar scars on your dinged up dome.

He took off his dirty white shirt and wife-beater and gave them to the muscle guy wearing the vinyl jacket who was too scared to pull his razors out of the pockets. They all gasped at his scarred and bullet riddled torso, and then the lieutenant spoke up, “Shit, you a banger Cave Boy? Looks like you been bangin’ fo a hundred years yo. Do dat shit hurt yo?”

I’m getting sleepy—no, that’s bad. Say something.

“Only when I breathe man.”

As the muscle guy sniffed suspiciously at the shirts he took off his belt and handed it to the homeboy with his pants around his knees. “Here dude, ye ain’t runnin’ far from da cops wit dem pants down aroun’ yer knees.”

Stroke the lieutenant. He’s got a big ego.

He took out his wallet, separated the bills, and handed them to the lieutenant. “Looks like you in charge dude. ‘Bout fifty dare.”

He then handed the wallet to Tavon, who apparently was not the chief, but an initiate who was much better than the rest, none of whom had any backbone. “Here dude, you look like da braniac. Dare’s a I.D. in dare you could use to make a fake fer a dude my size. Jus’ replace da picture.”

He then began taking off his pants as the lieutenant starting running his mouth, “Yo Cave Boy, yo some kine a weird-ass red-bone or sometin’? Yo talk like some country nigga.”

Kill him.

“You legs as long as mine. Dare you go.”

He was now standing in his jock in the lightly falling snow which was just melting on his overheated body. The gang-bangers were discussing his leg and hip scars—most of the bullet holes being in his right hip, butt, and thigh—and now he just wanted to be left alone.

“If y’all don’ mine I’m a might sleepy. I’ll be off yer bench by dark—a half hour is all I need.”

As he stretched his arms along the back of the bench and laid his head back and spread his legs to dissipate some of the heat he could feel the planet spinning around in his temples. He felt like a bird vectoring in on magnetic north…

The bangers had been arguing about what to do with him. Eventually, Tavon volunteered to stay and shoot him and the others made off in the gathering snow tossing threats his way. They did not go far. They were staying to watch his execution.

So, this is an initiation. How did they get their hooks into a kid this bright?

“What you doin’ wit dem fer? Yer betta den dat.”

His eyes were still closed and he could feel the water from the melting snow pooling in his sockets, cooling down his white-hot eyes.

Cat’s got his tongue.

“Look son, dey watchin’ ya, en ain’t gonna stop skulkin’ till ya pull dat trigger. Squeeze one into da outside a my left thigh.”

Are you brain-dead dummy?

Tavon’s voice was cracking from the stress, “I can’t sir. I don’t want to shoot anyone. Besides you’ve been shot enough. How are you even alive?”

“Cause Da Man ain’t done wit me boy. Look, I can eat .25 shorts all day. Jus’ make sure ya hit meat. Keep away from da knee area.”

“Mister, I can’t!”

Look him in the eyes and let him see the nothing.

“If you do not shoot me, I will rip your head off and hunt them boys until I’ve eaten every one of their hearts. And that would be doing you a favor. Because if I didn’t wipe out your friends and you returned with a broken promise they would surely take it out on your ma—and I know a boy who speaks like you has got a ma. So pop one off in my thigh man. I ain’t got all day. It’s near time fer me ta go.”

He’s soul searching.

“Do it son, squeeze the trigger.”

It actually sounded like that time he had hit Randy in the forehead with a spoonful of cherry gelatin—Thanks for the ammo Mom! Yeah Big Bro whooped your ass then, right in the kitchen!

“Yer friends is high-tailin’ it now son—don’ wanna be ‘round fer da cops I s’pose. Look, when you done coughin’ up dat cereal sit down here. I need ta say sometin’.”

“Yes sir.”

Tavon took a seat next to him.

“Whaz yer name?”

You know his name Dummy!

“Tavon, Tavon Price.”

“How old you Tavon?”

He was trying to listen, and was thinking about how much Charlie would like Tavon as a little brother or maybe a foster child, but the planet was really beginning to wobble. The next thing he knew he was standing in front of Tavon holding his hands, and then he was telling the boy to get back so he didn’t get burned…

An internal flash of lightning lit up his mind’s eye, and he turned instinctively toward the light in the darkening sky that he knew would be there; the star that was not a star; his own private rocket into the past. He spread his arms and opened his hands, inhaling the heavily ionized air into his ever expanding lungs…