“It is 17 past the hour and that was Tom Petty with ‘Breakdown’ on 95.1 Heavy, Toronto’s premiere radio station for all hard rod cssic metal. ing up we have Van Halen with ‘Mean Street’. Stay tuned after a word from our sponsors.”

  An old radio sat on top of a hard pstitainer, its cassette window hung open, the joint broken and uo shut. It could still piy station around, though, so the sound its speaker bsted off of the warehouse’s tall brick walls. The festivities of ercials peted with the ctter and boom of stru for audio dominance across the building’s main floor.

  The main room’s crete base had been drilled away for supports. The stru was overseen by Paul Windsley, a 193cm mountain of a maood off a er on the floor and through thick goggles, watched his men tear up the ground. Although his business was as legit as any other in the eyes of the city’s record keepers, Wihrived in the underbelly of society; taking jobs where the full nature of the stru wouldn’t be revealed. He had a lot of tele like that, so it was no problem to him if he was unsure what exactly he was making. It was ritual for him to work with inplete information.

  However, he had heard that Dead Head’s gang was full of creeps. In terms of Dead Head’s gang, Windsley only really talked with the leader himself or “Shimmer”– was that a name?– and they seemed like normal people although the former dressed like he wao show off his Hallowe’en e early. Were the creeps hiding?

  The less presentable parts of society had a way of unc the various mutants that lived across the city, and perhaps the world, but it was only a month ago Wiarted hearing about them. Frankly, it was about time he saw one of them. Windsley looked across the warehouse floor. The only men that were not part of his stru crew were two normal-looking guys prepping pstic crates in the er.

  Maybe the creeps had Friday off.

  Dead Head walked out of his office, a paled hardhat on his head. The maes quieted down for a minute so Windsley walked over past the base of stru towards Dead Head. When Dead Head saw Windsley ing over, he backed up towards the door of his office to find a quiet(er) er to discuss things.

  “The base is looking solid,” said Paul, “so we won’t have to repce the whole floor.”

  Dead Head nodded. “Good.”

  Windsley looked around the warehouse. The building was old but it was iy good dition. The only problems with it were superficial like the dents on the side of the wall that looked like someoossed a sledgehammer against it.

  “Where did you pick this pce up?” asked Windsley.

  Dead Head didn’t know. Shimmer was responsible for the purchase. “I don’t have that information. I’d have to talk to my assistant for that.”

  Windsley only had the floor update for Dead Head and he only desired the tidbit on where Dead Head picked up the pce. Doh that, he went baonitor his men. Dead Head looked over the stru and calcuted in his head how long it would take before new crete oured, when the frame would be finished, and thehe portal would be funal. He gave himself the reputation of being a calm and in-trol leader but his patie sensitive whenever he thought about the end of this projed what it would give him.

  He went baside the offid sat down at his desk, looking over his budget book. He was still doing monthly payments for the warehouse, and he had the moo pay off the ehing, but if he smmed down the moo pay the cost entirely, it would have looked suspicious. No, he drip-fed moo the bank and carried on with his eical theatre.

  The vent in the er rumbled. Dead Head looked over to see Haze seeping through, the cloud boy needing to turn into a featureless mist to pass through barred surface. Ohe majority of his foggy mass was through, the cloud boy reformed into his humanoid shape, plete with shirt and pants. He popped down on the floor.

  “Get down!” hissed Dead Head, eyeing through the office window at the crew managing the main floor. “What if they see you?”

  Haze scowled and got down on the floor. “Why do I gotta hide myself from those stru guys? I don’t have to with the rest of the crew.”

  “Because they are not in anization,” said Dead Head. “They are outsiders and– si isn’t easy to e across a stru pany that will work with this gang without rep us to authorities on suspi of terrorism–” He took in a breath after that long rhetorical detour– “I’d like to keep these men as fortable as possible and not funt my more etric members of the gang, like you arov.” He also didn’t want Thrash ing around the warehouse but there was another reason why he didn’t want a curvy woman in a catsuit around a crew of hardw men.

  Haze slumped in the er, unsure what to do with himself now. He hung his arms over his knees aed his fa his wrists.

  Dead Head peered at Haze zing about. “How are you liking that room Shimmer set you up with?”

  “It’s okay,” said Haze, not lifting his head to avoid talking into his hands.

  Haze was young but he needed a proper residence if he was going to fun in Dead Head’s gang. Shimmer set the living cloud up with a room in an apartment on the south side of Greenwood, some pce that Haze’s misty form could slip in and out of without being noticed. All Haze knew about it was that Shimmer took care of the bills.

  Dead Head wasn’t good at small talk, but he’d accept his minion taking his new pce without any pints. Dead Head said, “We’ll be heading to the b ter. Will you be ready?”

  “Yeah, yeah...” said Haze, defensively.

  A sed big batch. Dead Head wasn’t sure who he was going to sell it to, but he’d cross that bridge when he came to it. He’d need more moo keep the pce running until the portal was finished.

  He watched the workers cut up a k of the floor and lift the crete out.

  Soohought to himself, soon.

  Later came quickly for Haze.

  Dead Head got a phone call saying Seven was already at the b, so when the su down and the Windsley’s me home, Dead Head met with Haze and Thrash in the parking lot. Thrash had to give Dead Head guff about her being barred from the warehouse during stru hours because she k was less about her strange plexion and more about her being an attractive woman that would pull eyes towards her. Dead Head de, though.

  It was Dead Head’s Cadilc DeVille that would be the ride over but Thrash was the one driving. The vehicle was still rolling strong after five years in Dead Head’s possession. Dead Head got in the back with Haze. Sure, Haze could have flew to the b much quicker than driving through Toronto traffic, but Dead Head insisted on his escort.

  After Dead Head locked the warehouse up tight, they all got in the vehicle. Haze thought it ointless for him, a person made of cloud, to buckle up, but it felt stra to. Thrash pulled out from the warehouse and they hit the road towards e.

  The windows on the vehicle were tinted, so even if Haze looked outward at the sights of the city, nobody around could look in. It was a Friday night, so the streets were loud. Teens were out making noise aing started on their weekends like a few kids walking the sidewalk with one girl tugging on a guy’s coat, everyone ughing with each other.

  The front windows weren’t tinted but even if people looked in and saw Thrash’s face, the darkness of the night would have shrouded the odd, blue pigment of skin and hair. As far as most people around were ed, Dead Head’s transport was nothing but a nice-looking car rolling through the neighbourhood.

  In the silence of the car ride, curiosity came over Haze so he turned over to Dead Head and asked, “So, uh, what’s that portal going to be for anyway?”

  Thrash flipped on her ears. She was curious herself.

  Dead Head khese questions would e. He had worked with Shimmer to e up with a list of excuses, a cover story to ceal a would-be unpopur truth about what the portal’s true purpose was. Dead Head kept his tone disied. “It’s going to be for telep pces.”

  “Like where?” asked Haze, with all the btant curiosity of a child.

  Dead Head was not used to dealing with someone so young. He choked a groan back. “Banks. Maybe if we are feeling more disruptive we could steal something important, like the Decration of Independence.”

  “The Decration of Independence?” asked Thrash. “Why would you steal that?”

  Dead Head smirked. “Just to see how the Ameri gover would react.”

  Seen by hrash grimaced. She didn’t read the news often but khat America typically responded with events of that magnitude with warfare.

  Part of selling the lie, as Dead Head and Shimmer brainstormed weeks ago, was to leave some believable ambiguity to what the portal was capable of. Said Dead Head, “Stealing from a vault– a big vault– is something I had in mind. We could always use more money.”

  “’t you do that anyway?” asked Haze. “With your powers?”

  “Not from a big bank,” said Dead Head. “Even if I got to the vault, I wouldn’t be able to get out there with much. I could disable every camera in the pce but enough people would see me that I’d leave a clear trail.” He tapped the edge of the window. “That’s why I stuck to robbing smaller pces for years. It’s a lot easier to use my nullifying abilities on smaller systems.”

  Thrash eyed Dead Head in the rear-view mirror. “Like that loan agency that got two of your men in jail. You could have dohat yourself.”

  Dead Head let out a disgruntled sigh. “Yes, Thrash. I know.”

  “So it teleport people through?” asked Haze.

  “Yes,” said Dead Head, spouting a practised lie. “We’re not sure how easy it is, so we o get it built, the it, to figure out what it’s capable of. Then, we will make substantial pns and use the portal to its fullest.”

  Haze wased about the idea of a portal but he had no further questions. The three of them tio the b quietly.

  The “b” was actually the basement to and old house in a neighbourhood of old houses. Few of them looked anything but decrepit. The b house had its lot occupied by Seven’s vehicle so Thrash parked on the side of the street. When the Dead Head’s crew got out of the car, everyo a smell of the manufacturing pnt nearby, some kind of “chemical” smell to quote Lombardi wheo drive Haze there a week ago. It wasn’t terrible– actually, it retty faint– but it caught everywhere when the factot going.

  There was no one around to spot the cloud boy ing out of the Cadilc but it wasn’t a time to stick around outside. As Haze walked up to the porch, a door opened. Oher side was Seven.

  Haze, Dead Head, and Thrash walked ihe house’s interior wasn’t aer thaside. Although tidy in the sehat all the dishes were put away and the floor was mopped, several spots on the walls had holes ihere were cupboard doors missing. A board in the pnk floor was turned up. Thrash could sehe mice running through the walls.

  But they were not there to hang out. Haze khe drill. He went to the back of the hall where there was a doorway leading into the basement. Other smells, more powerful than the oside, heaved up the staircase like the sulphurs of the underworld. Haze could smell them (how a cloud could smell, he didn’t actually know), but he could stomach it.

  Seven walked up to a vent riding up the hallway’s wall. He patted it, a deep rumble cttering out. “Rerouted the vent to the basement. Helps with the smell.” He poi Dead Head’s coat. “Basement doesn’t have heat, though.”

  Last time they cooked a batch, there was a noticeable smell around the house afterwards. Even timing out cooking to the funs of the pnt down the road, the pnt’s own stench didn’t overpower the ohey made whehey got together to bake. Still, redug the smell of synthesizing drugs was important in case neighbours started asking around.

  Thrash put on a polypropylene mask and after removing his hood, Dead Head did the same. Seven walked them to the end of the hall and all three of them went downstairs to join Haze in produg the gang’s big batch of product to sell.