Snippet #1447327

Not having found any eateries that would garauntee a meal that wouldn't cause dysentery in District Delta, Eos made his way through the waning crowds into Gamma. He had always found it astounding how quickly the air changed from a fetid haze of grimey dust one had to grit their teeth to filter out to an air of...clean, was not the word. It was still rather dingey, but couldn't hold a candle to the smell of waste that seemed to permeate Delta. With at least some half-decent clothing on--as the absence of shoes was not particularly noted in Gamma--Eos perused the swindling merchant blankets that seemed to always be in service. "The sector of charlatans indeed..." he whispered.

The first seven or eight blankets had some food, but most was either moldy, rotten on the inside or too good to be true. Twice a merchant eyed the half-full coin purse that hung half-revealed from Eos's pocket. A cool glare was levelled their way each time, although the concealed forms lying in the shadows of the nearby alley ways were not reassuring. Still, eventually an older man with wispy tufts of colorless hair for a beard provided cabbage stew with some sort of brownish meat that was probably better left unidentified. It wasn't bad, and the elderly shopkeeper had some old chef's tools and sterilizing agents so Eos was sure that the food was at least prepared properly.

As the younger man sat down to wait for the merchant--Rikard as he soon learned, he was regailed with a tale of how a lowly Gamma-goer came across such 'glamorous' tools of a trade. Rikard was originally a man born into a relatively wealthy merchant home in Beta. He carried on his family's tradition and learned to sell, haggle and produce various foods. Food was always necessary, Rikard had said with a gap toothed smile. The younger Rikard was quite a success, married young and was summarily robbed blind by the woman whom he devoted his life to. His family disowned their foolish son, saying it was his own fault for marrying a woman of a lower station and left him with nothing. Now, fifty years later, he was living as a two-bit cook scraping by. The bowls were wrapped in plastic and cheap cloth to keep them warm before being handed over to Eos. He fished around in his coin purse for a moment before a shriveled hand was placed atop of his. Eos looked up in puzzlement to see Rikard's lopsided grin.

"It's hard enough," the old man said, "to come by anyone willing to look you in the eye instead of your coin purse 'round these parts. Even scarcer for someone without wrinkles to listen to a man my age prattle on about the past. Keep your coins, i've taken time enough as payment."

Eos smiled sadly, then clasped Rikard's hand. In it he left a single gold coin. Twenty times the worth of the food he had just purchased. He spun on his heel and quickly walked away before any word of protest could leave the old man's mouth. After a couple blocks Eos slowed his pace and glanced half-heartedly at the remaining blankets and stalls hawking wares. Most of it was trash, but a single trinket caught his eye. A copper necklace with a pendant in the half-circle shape of the rising sun. I haven't watched the sunrise in so long... A deep pit welled in his stomach, one caused by the thought that he had betrayed Selene's memory. The notion oozed through his mind like a greasy wisp of smoke while Eos carried the food back towards Delta. He was nearing the lodging area of Gamma now, almost at the border.

Without thinking he squeezed the sunburst pendant that now hung from his neck.