On Sinners' street, fake sun screen bottles were being sold on the market for wholesale price. This made the small red bottles irresistible to customers. These consumers who were buying the knock off sun screen didn't suspect anything faulty with the products they received.
Nonetheless, a rumor spread around the country that this knock off sun screen wasn't as effective. Conspiracists argued Faye, the ex-con who owned Sinners' street, sold these fake versions of the sun screen to increase sun burn cases. The rumor was quickly dismissed because of its outlandish nature.
Ivory opens a trap door leading her into the outside world. The light was blinding at first but she rubbed her eyes quickly adjusting to the endless day.
Ivory whispers to herself, "The trap door had been locked before… Did someone leave the underground city recently?"
Ivory stretches for a moment and closes the trap door behind her. She locks the hatch just like Lyra had done in the past as a courtesy to her despite the older woman's rude demeanor.
Ivory says to herself with a hint of frustration, "Where the hell did Lyra go? She just disappeared and left me to deal with Icarus."
Ivory smiles grimly as she walks past the rows of brown houses mumbling to herself, "Icarus was a faceless who wanted to protect humans with the sun burn? I don't buy that. He has to have some ulterior motive."
She hears footsteps begin pattering behind her as she holds a generic pocket knife tightly in her coat's pocket. Ivory was alone now and maybe the tiny bit of intimidation the young woman held to others in this area had disappeared now that Lyra wasn't with her.
Sinners' street was not where she wanted to die and she didn't think anyone would for that matter. The gangsters apparently cut people up like a butcher would to a dead animal and sold their body parts on the black market. Organs and skin were in high demand in some areas of the country.
The rich or other folks who were well off got injured all the time and they needed transplants desperately. These types of people would pay anything to get out of a terrible situation they found themselves in. Desperate people were often the easiest to sell a product to.
The moment thugs saw vulnerable victims. Groups of these gangsters would gather around their victims and dismember them.
The bodies were then quickly placed into vehicles that would keep their bodies constantly at a cool temperature to preserve their body parts to be sold later.
Ivory mutters under her breath, "Shit. Shit. Shit."
Multiple footsteps began echoing across the empty street.
Ivory ran as fast as she could as she heard the footsteps accelerating behind her.
The young woman with a dreadful look in her eyes made a sharp left turn and passed a row of broken houses. She refused to look back. The right side of her body radiated a pain that felt as though someone had been poking her way too hard. The pain must have come from a bad runner's stitch.
Ivory grits her teeth as her pace slows down, "Damn it."
She stops and holds the right side of her body panting as the footsteps stop behind her. The runner's stitch disappears.
Ivory gets a good grip on the generic pocket knife's handle in her muddy white coat. She turns slightly to look at her pursuers with curiosity and fear mixed together.
There was one very tall man who was a giant compared to the rest of the people in his ragtag group of thugs. The middle aged man had pale skin, short red hair, and a long scar running across his eye holding a cartoonishly large wooden club. He wore a black t-shirt and pants that were most likely used to blend into his environment at night.
A middle aged woman stood behind the large man holding a small dagger. She had long red hair, pale skin, and a scar trailing down her neck. Similar to the man in front of her, she wore a black shirt and pants.
Lastly, there was a child in the back of the group with a pair of rectangular blue glasses and a black top hat. The kid had light brown skin, a scar on his cheek, and a devilish grin. Why would this kid be here?
The thought of a child working for a group of gangsters disturbed her but the reality was this wasn't uncommon. In lower class areas of the world during this time kids were hired by gangs to do their bidding.
A lot of the time, children were brought with higher ranking members in a gang to show them how this line of work is. The gang members likely drilled in these kids' heads how to perform their jobs correctly through visual demonstrations like this.
Ivory says with confidence walking backwards, "Stay back…"
The middle aged woman starts matching her pace walking toward her, "Aw. That's adorable hun. You can't fake confidence in Sinners' street. Just accept you're a scared little girl and surrender."
Ivory's voice shakes gripping her knife in her pocket, "Stay back. I'm warning you."
The middle aged woman who is almost right in front of her positions her dagger above her shoulder holding it like a bat as she prepares to slash her into pieces, "What are you going to do?"
Ivory's sun burn activates on her neck as her eyes turn into a dark shade of blue. She lifts her hands out of her pockets instinctively as a large icicle shoots out of her pointer finger penetrating the woman's eye.
The middle aged woman screams falling to the floor as tears stream down her face, "Fuck… What was that?"
The big man picks her up from the ground and motions the kid to follow behind him cautiously.
Ivory's eye color returns to a light shade of brown as she says with confidence, "Stay away or else you'll be like her."
The bigger man and child nod their heads while beginning to run away in a frenzy in the opposite direction.
Ivory starts to feel light headed and her stomach growls making her talk in a hushed tone to herself, "I feel really hungry all of a sudden. This ability it's almost using up a surplus of calories when I use it."
She takes out a generic old protein bar from her white coat's pocket and stuffs the bar in her mouth. The light headiness vanishes instantly.
Ivory says to herself, "This ability really must require that I am well nourished to use it. This will be important to remember."
She begins walking for a few miles taking a few right and left turns. Ivory watches her own back and makes sure she isn't followed on the way out of this street. She approaches the Sinners' street entrance.
Ivory walks past the green Sinners' street sign staring at it for a moment with longing as she leaves, leaving this nightmare in the past.
She feels her heart begin to flutter. Ivory holds herself in a small ball as the delayed onset of an anxiety attack she was supposed to have earlier began. Her heart beat's speed intensified as a feeling of dread passed through her body causing her vision to blur. The young woman was crying now and she couldn't help it.
Ivory focused on 5 things she could see in front of her, 4 things she could touch, 3 things she could hear, 2 things she could smell, and 1 thing she could taste.
The grounding exercise distracted her long enough for the anxiety attack's symptoms to be reduced.
Ivory let out a deep breath and sighed, wiping her eyes. She sniffled and tried her best to be in the moment.
Suddenly, Ivory heard footsteps walking toward her from behind her. She didn't feel the need to raise her guard. The footsteps felt as though they were familiar. This was someone, she could be safe around.
Ivory closed her eyes as the footsteps trailed around her, stopping in front of her. She opened her eyes as her best friend kneeled down to face her.
Abigail says with apprehension, "Ivory? Why were you outside Sinners' street? Don't tell me you tried to buy some off brand sun screen from this area again did you?"