Day 031 Hour 13: Red
The cracked sidewalks under my feet gave way to longer stretches of worn asphalt, as the buildings around Rust & Hollow grew slightly taller, less cramped. The kind of place where staircases were metal instead of concrete, where walls were painted once and then forgotten.
I knew the corner was close. I recognized the broken signage, the bend in the fence, the distinct leaning stop sign that someone had tagged with a cartoonish skull years ago. No one ever bothered to clean it. It had become part of the street's identity.
I slowed as I approached the final stretch.
The bus stop.
Old plexiglass shelter, scratched to hell. One side panel shattered, jagged edges taped clumsily with packaging film. The bench inside was bolted in place, legs rusting, paint long gone.
Everything looked exactly as I remembered it.
Except for one thing.
There was a box on the bench.
Wrapped in bright red paper, tight and clean. No bow. No note. Just a perfect cube, a little smaller than a breadbox, glossy and reflective in the slanted afternoon light.
It shouldn't have been there.
Not in this place. Not at this time.
It looked wrong. Too bright. Too festive. Like someone had dropped a celebration into a funeral.
I stopped just short of the shelter and scanned the area.
No one in sight.
No one watching from the windows, at least not openly.
And still… the box sat there, gleaming like it had just been placed down moments ago.
I didn't move forward yet.
This wasn't hesitation. It was pattern recognition.
Because everything in this part of the slums was built to blend — sand-colored bricks, smoke-colored glass, muted tarpaulin signage. Nothing wanted to be seen.
But this box wanted it.
It was designed to draw your eye.
And that alone made it dangerous.
Or deliberate.
Or both.
I leaned against the corner wall near the stop, keeping the box in my peripheral vision. The phone sat warm in my pocket. I knew the time was creeping closer to 14:00 — the moment I was supposed to take the next photo.
The bench was the subject.
But the box had taken center stage.
I ran one hand over the cheap phone's plastic edge, thumb hovering just above the camera toggle.
Because I didn't know if the Club had placed the box there to be photographed...
...or to see if I would dare move it.
Day 031 Hour 14: Red in Frame
The time ticked into place.
14:00.
No buzz this time.
No message.
Just the moment.
I stepped out from behind the corner, walked directly to the edge of the sidewalk facing the bus stop, and pulled out my phone.
I didn't stop to wonder who had placed the box.
I didn't circle the shelter.
I didn't scan for cameras or watch for watchers.
Because all of that — the curiosity, the fear, the need to understand — those things would slow me down. And the Club had never asked for understanding.
Only execution.
I lifted the phone.
The box glared at me through the screen. Too red. Too sharp. Like it had been added digitally after the photo was already taken. I adjusted the frame. Steady. Square. The shelter and the bench — both in full view. The cracked plexiglass catching light just enough to expose the worn seat and the corner where the box waited, bold and defiant.
No zoom. No crop.
No edits.
Click.
The shutter sound barely registered. The photo saved instantly. Timestamped. Untouched.
I lowered the phone, turned, and walked away.
No hesitation.
No glance back.
Just another completed task.
Just another photo no one asked me to explain.
Three blocks out, I finally exhaled.
The tension in my shoulders stayed, but the static in my chest had cleared. The image was clean. My position had been correct. I'd followed the rules. Exactly.
I didn't know what the box meant.
Maybe it was a decoy.
Maybe it was a test.
Maybe it was someone else's mission bleeding into mine.
But it didn't matter.
I had been told what to do.
And I had done it.
Day 031 Hour 15: The Walk to Flatbridge
I didn't waste time rerouting.
The second photo was done. In frame. Untouched.
The third location was already waiting.
Flatbridge crossing.Middle span.Face west.19:15.
I knew the route.
Flatbridge sat beyond the older edge of the district, past the rail tracks, the abandoned plastics yard, and the channel where the floodwaters carved their way through broken concrete. It wasn't beautiful. It wasn't safe. But it was still standing, which counted for something.
I checked my watch.
14:30.
Nearly five hours to get there. Enough time — but not a luxury.
Not if I wanted to avoid crowds, roadblocks, or wrong turns.
So I walked.
The streets stretched longer as I moved westward.
Noise shifted in tone — fewer markets, more machinery. Fewer mothers yelling, more silence between coughs. A different neighborhood rhythm. Even the dogs barked less.
I kept my pace steady. Shoes scuffing over gravel, arches aching with the slow creep of fatigue. I wasn't in bad shape. But I was carrying something more than my body. Something heavier.
Focus.
It had weight.
And it didn't ride easy.
I stopped only once — at a rusted pipe spigot protruding from a wall near the garment depot. The water was running. No sign, no cup. Just an old trickle. I rinsed my face, took three sips from cupped hands, and kept moving.
I didn't want anything that would weigh me down.
Not now.
As I neared the outer ring of the flood trench, the buildings grew sparse. Windows turned into slats. Rooftops bent under the weight of rain tanks. Birds nested in satellite dishes no longer aimed at anything.
Flatbridge was visible in the distance.
Long and low, like a concrete scar stretching across the channel.
I reached the start of it just after 18:45. A full half-hour early.
No one else in sight.
No cars.
No bikes.
Just the wind.
I walked the span slowly, each step syncing with the dull hum of the water below. The middle of the bridge had a line where the paint had peeled back to expose rusted rebar, and that's where I stopped.
I faced west.
The sun was beginning its descent — slanting low, glowing faintly through the haze, caught between orange and smoke.
This was the frame.
The moment hadn't arrived yet.
But I was ready.