Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY
IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I
generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family
rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to
write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote,
website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will
simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test
or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes
of them.
F Trope: Abandoned
Malls
Kehlanna McGee and
Trayvon Dehvahn crouched in an overgrown bit of woods that had sprung up around
a drainage ditch outside the four-meter-tall cyclone fence, staring at the
abandoned mall beyond. She said, “Wha’d’you think they’re hiding?”
Trayvon laughed
softly and said, “A shameful past of excess spending at cheesy, overpriced,
trendy shops that sold mostly lingerie and salt and pepper shakers?”
Kehlanna bumped
him with her shoulder, “Seriously.” She gestured. A pair of city black and
white police cars sat in the lot along with another pair of silver cars
emblazoned with a security logo.
“I am being serious,” he said, bumping her
back.
She rolled her
eyes and said, “Salt-and-pepper shakers are so 1950s...”
“Thereby retro and
incredibly popular now.”
“Ah!” she
exclaimed, lifting a finger, “Now I know you’re wrong.” She consulted her
palmtablet and after a few finger swipes, said, “ ‘Arbor Mills Mall, was the
destination of a generation of shoppers starting the year it opened in 2001 and
was decommissioned,” she paused and rolled her eyes, muttering, “...makes it
sound like it was an important aircraft carrier or something...in 2024...” she
paused then said, “That’s only half a generation.”
“Be that as it
may, are we going in or are we just going to stand here talking about
generations and malls?”
“In,” she said
suddenly. “But we’re going to have to go back to the trailer and get a few
things.” She paused, “And wait until it’s dark.”
Trayvon grinned,
nodded and headed for where they’d parked trailer two kilometers away.
***
Four hours later,
dressed in knee-high rubber boots and wearing black, they made their way
silently through the culvert. No one had taken time to fence it, so they easily
slipped under the meager security. Trayvon tapped his earpiece and
subvocalized, “What are we expecting to find in here?”
“Treasure.”
He couldn’t help
but snort, and Kehlanna hissed at him, sub-vocalizing, “Quiet or they’ll hear
us.”
“I’m not the one
hissing like a punctured whipped cream can.”
They moved as far
as they could in the ravine, then climbed at a likely spot. His night goggles
confirmed they were only six meters short of their goal. They scanned for the
police and security cars, saw neither, so Trayvon stood up and aimed a very-illegal
device at the surface between them and the abandoned mall. After a moment, he
subbed, “No active pressure security spots and no evidence of landmines.”
“Landmines?”
Khehlanna subbed.
“You said there’s
treasure. People protect treasure with landmines and lasers and other high tech
gadgets. I was checking for everything.”
She nodded in the
darkness a moment later, then subbed, “Let’s go. The map I found has a
maintenance door into the rear of one of the anchor stores straight ahead.” She
paused, then went up the embankment and scurried across the broken asphalt. He
followed three minutes later. By then, she’d cut through the locking mechanism
of the door with an infrared laser. Trayvon sprayed the old hinges with a
silent stream of lubricant and then door swung open a moment later as Kehlanna
pulled it.
They entered the
darkness and the goggles switched to a sonar image – the power had been cut to
the building a decade earlier when it closed
in order to prevent fires. They avoided collapsed ceiling tiles and
piles of mouldering cardboard boxes. Trayvon subbed, “If this is the ‘treasure’
we can expect to find, we might as well leave right now.”
“Nah. There has to
be something in here that those people are protecting.”
“Hmmm.”
They exited the
back room of the store and passed through piles of stacked shelving, display
cases, light fixtures, and garbage until they reached the mall proper. In front
of him, Kehlanna stopped abruptly and cursed out loud rather than subbing.
Trayvon subbed,
“Shut up! I can’t tell if there are audio security pickups in here...” He
stopped as he pulled up alongside her. Outside the door with its corroding
security gate, a group of three people, linked together by rope tie around
their necks, passed by. The figure at the front of their line, holding the rope
and wearing an army-style helmet that was twice as large as Trayvon had ever
seen before, was a giant creature that looked for all the world, like yeti…
Names: ♀ American, Irish ; ♂ American, Greek
Image: http://www.skyscrapernews.com/images/pics/6255CaernarfonCastle_pic1.jpg
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