Reserved for Charles Choudhury - SCP Foundation

Reserved for Charles Choudhury

Word Count: 6k

Reading Time: 21 minutes

Please read SCP-5384 for the necessary context prior to reading this. Thank you in advance.

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F.A.Q.

Agent Charles Choudhury stares forward, disbelief painted on his face as realization slowly crashes through his system in waves. Layers of impossibility stack and twist upon one another. A single note stuck to the laminated glass of his newly issued automobile looks back at him with defiance.

Confusion was first. Then came the dozens of thoughts racing in his mind. They all search for solutions to a problem that need not be solved, for the answer is right in front of him. A cherry red Ram 1500.

"This, this is for me?" The researcher at his left nods back at him.

"It's been cleared of any memetic, cognitohazardous, or otherwise anomalous tampering," Naomi Bradley said as she produced a set of keys to the sleek red pickup. "It's all yours. Consider it thanks for your good work."

Tossing the key ring over to Choudhury, Bradley watches as he fumbles the catch and lets them fall to the cement with a thin metallic jingle. He crouches down and scrounges around.

"Uh, uh, tha-thanks, Naomi, I-" he pauses and takes three breaths. "How is this possible? I thought Matkins-"

"Evidently, SCP-5384 was not neutralized as we thought it was," her monotonous voice carried a sliver of exhaustion. She managed to conceal the bags under her eyes with foundation. "Which brings me back to-"

She gestures forward at the glistening vehicle in the sunlight.

"This. Charles, if it comes back like how it was before-"

"Hold on," he looks away from his reward for one moment and turns to face her. His eyebrows furrow. "Is this a bribe? Are you bribing me to pick up the project again?"

"Maybe, Charles. I mean, it could have been sent to an abatement facility or donated to someone who actually needs it. And you could have just been reassigned to keep working on this without getting a free car out of it," she says, turning to meet his eyes. "But the higher-ups seem to like you and think you could be useful if SCP-5384 does reappear. You're pretty fortunate, all things considered."

Choudhury's eyes drift downward at the keys in his hand, then back to the ruby on the stone.

"So, I'll let you get acquainted with it. The manual's in the glovebox. Registration and insurance have both been handled, though you'll have to talk to Goldbaker after the first year," Naomi turns and walks back to the entrance of Site-48. "I'll see you on Monday, Charles."

Charles chortles to himself briefly, absent-mindedly fiddling with the keys as he stares at the car. His face turns with no solid expression in mind.

It finally comes to a conclusion as he silently mouths Thank you, Matkins.

Driving home from work was like flipping a coin for Charles. He could either become entangled in the late afternoon traffic, forced stuck amidst the endless stream of engines around his own, and having to stop for every terribly-timed pedestrian, or it would be a smooth sailing, calming endeavor. This time, it was the former.

Two months of wear had beset him and his prize. From the hordes of pigeons relentlessly shitting on his truck to the soul-sucking day-to-day of monitoring security feeds and anomalous channels for hours on end. Now the detours around the city and the rides home felt free by comparison, if strenuous at times.

Wearily, he clicks the turn signal on, coming up to the intersection as another flush of motors all form a blockade with their passage. They all just want to get to their own destinations. One, two, three, five - eight pass before someone finally lets him through. He feels a rush and turns the corner. Two seconds after already passing by the stranger, he realized he'd forgotten to wave thanks.

Making his way through the suburbs was refreshingly easy. His apartment was only a few more blocks down the street from the red light he was stuck at now. The sounds of light chatter on the radio crowd the void. Some talk show host laughs with some woman, neither of whom Charles knew, the joke of which he didn't hear. Children shout, playing in the park to his left. The outside car engines reverberate through the windows, all this submerging Choudhury into a sea of white noise.

He glances left, overlooking a collection of blank faces withheld by the distance. He pays little attention to them, absent-mindedly watching the kids playing on the swings, half-heartedly jealous. A portly, scraggily dressed dude sits on an iron bench. The light turns green. Two old guys wearing neon shorts run around the fenced-in tennis court.

Choudhury's eyes peel away from the park and back to the road as someone slams on the horn behind him.

-

Charles felt a slight sense of unease for a moment as he lay unfathomably comfortably in bed. He lingered there for a second longer than he should have, his brain tells him. He shouldn't have been there that long. Inconvenienced others had seen him. What kind of moron was he? He tries his best to push away these thoughts. After all, in only five hours he'd have to get up for work.

Monitoring. The cornerstone of the Foundation's active containment efforts. A long, arduous system of fishing for hours in datastreams, waiting for the right channel, the right tuna, and the right moment to align. Then catching could be offloaded to the men with guns and that would be that.

Real fishermen at least get to walk away with dinner when they finish for the day. Instead, Charles gets to sit, clicking and typing away, searching this security camera to that podcast microphone and this online messaging board to that dealership promo. At least now he knew where he could get his truck worked on without getting scammed to high Hell.

Boredom could hardly cover this feeling Choudhury endured every single day. Unchallenged, unrewarded. But, at the very least, he was getting paid well enough to not dare to pursue another career path. It will get better, he thinks. Maybe he could find Matkins and put an end to all this. After three months, it was clear the Foundation higher-ups would never let up until they had solid evidence of the man's neutralization.

The reports all said that the amnestic treatment was successful. They gave him a place to stay and kept tabs on him there until he just stopped showing up. And then that truck magically appeared in the one part of the Site-48 parking lot that cameras did not cover, and now the whole facility was on high alert.

High alert that Choudhury had to work off of.

Naomi would occasionally pop in from time to time, checking in on Charles' progress with the project. Each time she came in with a stack of papers in hand and left with her fingers in her pockets. She could mask the exhaustion under her eyes, but not inside them. She would return to her office and pick up yet another stack of paperwork to review, and from there on no one would see Researcher Bradley until her shift ended.

Choudhury would try to pick up his own pace to help her when he could. He'd be understanding whenever she delivered more work to go over, and even try to stay for some overtime when he knew she was busy there too. Another day goes by, another ten, maybe twelve hours to spend. Another sheet to fill in. Just one more page to read. But after all this time, it still felt as though they were searching for geese to chase.

-

A sharp duo of taps knock on the door, jolting Choudhury's head from the mess on his desk. Instinctively, his mouth shouts out Come in! while his body tries to stretch itself before the visitor would see him like this.

Naomi steps in, carrying a collection of transcripts, notices, police reports, parking tickets, and subjects of interest pertaining to the current status of select persons of interest to the project. Each would require a review in full, followed by properly signing off on the reports on his terminal, to which he would have to enter an authentication token just after checking off that the material he had just read and confirmed that he had read was, in fact, a complete waste of time.

The usual order.

"Hey, Naomi," he scrambles to make space on his table for the new workload for today, shoving dozens of other, similar papers away or to the floor entirely, to be dealt with later. "How are you?"

"Fine, fine," lying through her teeth like an experienced veteran of the Foundation. "Nothing interesting. What about you? Did you follow up on that incident down on 43rd?"

"Yeah. Some teenagers got drunk and decided to take their parents' cars for a race."

"That's it?" she looks down at him. He keeps himself from shrugging.

"One of the cars was from Matkins. It was traded around a bunch so it probably slipped our radar. I left it to the officers there since there wasn't anything notable about it."

"And you didn't come to me about this? Slipped past our radar?" she deviates from her natural routine and takes a seat across from Charles.

"Matkins probably fudged the work on it."

"SCP-5384 has never shown the capacity to fail to write up the paperwork for one of its clients."

"He's only human," Choudhury finally shrugs.

Bradley groans, letting her head fall to her hands. Her eyelids seem comfortable as they shut.

"Just get these back to me as soon as you can."

"I will. I will. Thank you."

She looks up, tilting her head.

"For what?"

He stutters, mixing words as his jaws work against him. Four and a half hours in, his brain was far from well connected to the rest of his body.

The sight of his head bobbing around was enough for Naomi. She stands, turns, opens the door again, and walks out. Choudhury groans.

"Damn it."

Killing time outside the park once again, Choudhury sits and waits for a family of four and an elderly Asian woman to cross the street. Then a group of children joins in on the fun and dashes about the road, forming a chainlink series of traffic cones, blockading his left turn as they mindlessly scamper home from an assuredly long and tiring day of school.

How joyful. Not even a care in the whole wide world.

Lost in his thoughts again, Charles looks up to see the time ticking down on the sidewalk's clock and floors the petal to the metal to make the turn. No horns blare, fortunately. Dreadfully, he checks the rearview mirrors and hopes that nobody saw him just sitting there mindlessly.

He turns his eyes back to the road where a dishevelled Larry Matkins attempts to jaywalk across the street.

Choudhury swerves hard right, narrowly threading the needle betwixt two parked cars as he clambers inside to get the car, the seatbelt, and his Fitbit heart spike detection off. The truck is parked half atop the sidewalk as he pulls out his phone. The first number to dial would be Naomi's.

He stumbles to get to his feet and leaves the truck in its sidewalk-facing perpendicularly parked position. The alarm blares. Some civilians arrive just to inaudibly badger him about this. They don't matter. All that matters right now is catching up with Matkins so that proper personnel can handle this. The right men with the right procedures, protective equipment, experience, numbers, training, and - guns, he briefly thinks before shying that thought away.

He isn't dangerous, Choudhury thinks. Matkins is just a car salesman, just a friendly face who… managed to evade the Foundation for the past three months. Who is seemingly impervious to amnestics. Who broke into some of the most fortified legal and organizational systems the anomalous world - or otherwise - has to offer.

Who is now currently seated, apparently winded on a cast iron park bench sweating profusely with a loaf of squashed bread clutched to his ribs.

Looking down at the man, Choudhury pockets the phone. He leans down close while trying to maintain a distance; the man was too busy resting his eyes and body to notice.

Sporting some slight stubble, dressed in that same suit - now dirtied and visibly moist - and coated in yellowish mustard stains around his cheeks, the absolutely unlikely answer is certain. This is the man himself; Larry Matkins, in the flesh. Choudhury has to be sure.

"Mr. Matkins? Is that you, sir?"

The man's eyes warily budge themselves open, then widen and shut again in dual reaction to Charles and the bright sunlight. Almost instantly, he hops himself up and grabs Choudhury's hand, dropping the bread.

"Charles? Well, I'll be. How have you been, my friend? How have you been?"

Taken aback, Choudhury stutters. "Uh, uh, fine, Mr. Matkins. Fine, I guess."

"That is great to hear, Charles. Tell me, how are you enjoying the truck? I tried my best to swing for real Deep Pearl Cherry, but I figure a couple shades ain't that much to split hairs over."

"It's great. It's really great, but uh-"

Taking a step to Charles' side, Matkins takes a look down the hill where a commotion of civilians has crowded around the improperly parked Ram. The alarm continues to alert everybody that part of its front end was scraped on the concrete.

"Glad… glad to hear that, Charles."

Choudhury looks between the man who has eluded him for months and his semi-totaled gift, internally cursing himself. "I, I uh, I-"

"It's all fine, Charles. I'll be right here when you come back."

Once again, looking between the two, Choudhury hesitates. "Are you sure?"

"Sure."

Choudhury nods. "Alright, just, uh, just stay right there," and he takes off to rescue his truck from the clutches of a perturbed collection of the inconvenienced.

-

Just like he said, there he was, watching the birds clutter around a sampling of seedlings from his octogenarian bench mate, Matkins sat as Charles came back up the hill a half hour afterwards. Half asleep, he groggily pulls himself up to clamber towards the park's new inhabitant.

"You sure took your time."

Reaching the top and coming to stand in front of Matkins, Choudhury sighs. "Sorry. I had to deal with some parking ticket and fend off a police officer just to stop the thing from getting impounded."

"That's the system for you. Guess that'll just become another one of your guys' statistics."

"I'm sorry?"

"You sure like to say that a lot, Charles."

"Look, I didn't have a say in what happened. I tried to make the transition as smooth as possible."

"Yeah, I know. Bosses, am I right?"

Rearing back, Matkins thrusts his arms forward, consequently sending his upper body up and out of the seat as he gets to his legs. "Let's take a walk."

The two traverse through the park, passing by the tennis and basketball courts on their way. A couple walks their dog. A father pretends to block his son from scoring on the hoop. A sprinkler activates and a group of children there all screech and shout as the cold makes contact.

Matkins leans down and takes a sip from a public fountain. "So, what's on your mind?"

Choudhury ponders the question for a moment, quickly trying to decide on the best question to ask without the transcript recorder set up. "How do you still remember everything?"

"Oh, that one's easy," he wipes his mouth on his sleeve. "You got the report that your procedure worked?"

"Didn't it?"

"Probably would have if it happened."

"It- it didn't happen?"

"Nope. Look, whatever those other people did, that's their business, Charles. But I'm proud of what I did. Even if some people went and took it for granted, who cares? I helped people my way, and that's good enough for me."

"But now you're living like…"

"Like a man content with the life he's lived. Some people don't have that, you know?"

Choudhury mumbles in affirmation. They continue on and take a seat in the northeast corner, where a wooden table and two sets of benches lie. A motorcycle explodes by on the main street just beyond the fence of greenery beside them.

"So you're retired, then?"

"I guess so. It's not exactly the glamorous picture I had in mind back in my twenties and thirties, but it's enough. I suppose."

"The Foundation offered you accommodations. A whole house to yourself. I know most people would do anything for a deal like that. Why didn't you take it?"

"Because then I'd be living a lie. Having to pretend like I didn't do all that. Taking an entire house for just one man; I'm sure you realize why that's not great. Living with the FBI watching over me at all times doesn't sound fun. Or maybe there was some lingering frustration that my life's work was dismantled over something I had no control over. Take your pick."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Matkins-"

"None needed, Charles. None needed. I've been working on those reports telling you I wasn't there. Actually managed to hand that place over to a small family down on their luck."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I believe I can trust you to keep that on the down low."

Slouching forward, Choudhury rests his head on his hand and brushes away the thin black hair that had become overgrown and unkempt in his unending work. A breeze passes by with its shrill stinging chill. Matkins checks his wrist, looking down at the cracked watch ornamented with fake gold bronze inlay.

"You know, Charles, in all my years fighting against those corporate suits, I saw a lot of good people go down to keep the company afloat. Or, keep the board floating, really. I don't imagine the people you work for are any better."

"Everybody has to make hard decisions sometimes."

Matkins groans and sits upright. "Oh come on, Charles! That is complete and utter crap! Look, I've been in the system. I've seen how it all works from the bottom to the top of the totem pole. I know which choices are hard or easy to make because I made them all. I've seen the suits make business moves just for the sake of it, like merging with the Germans who have completely different priorities than the average American nuclear family!"

He pauses to breathe. "I've seen them lobby Congress to shower them with taxpayer money when the economy went bad and then still lay off thousands of hard workers before they even thought about dipping into one of their millionaire shareholder's vacation funds! That's the truth, Charles, not whatever corporate propaganda they drip down on you."

Choudhury leans up and lets his hands fall to the table. "You're right. But what can we do about it? The people at the top are there for a reason; that's just the way of the world."

"Charles, look at me. Never take the world at face value. Things can change."

"I quite literally work for the people keeping that from being true."

"Change is going to happen one way or another, and your bosses won't be able to stop that no matter what. You have to be ready to ride that wave when it comes."

Choudhury breaks from his idle stare at the tabletop to look up at Matkins with scepticism. "Ride that wave?"

Larry digs into his jacket and ruffles around, eventually producing a crumpled and wrecked magazine cover advertising something called a Sea-Doo. "Sorry, I've gotten into jetskis recently. Have you seen these guys in action?"

-

Waiting at the bus stop was a ritual that Choudhury had not missed these past few months. Either standing around awkwardly or being seated in the three allotted spaces; sitting right next to a loud-mouthed teenager and his buds as well as an elderly man on the phone both chattering on about inane nonsense. All whilst waiting twenty minutes for the next one to arrive as he'd just missed the last one.

But now in the late afternoon on the parkside sidewalk, it was quiet and alone, and the only other person here was Matkins as the two waited.

Weighing his options, Choudhury occasionally would look back at the fellow to confirm the situation was real. If he called Naomi now, then the teams could come and finish the job, and he'd be able to move on with his life.

He looked back at Larry once more. That Euclid-level Veil-threatening humanoid entity. That menace to society Choudhury had spent the last three months working to track down sat there in the same tattered suit he'd worn since that ill-fated interview. When Charles had to tell him that he couldn't keep dispensing out free cars.

Just a guy trying to do right for others.

Even if others wouldn't lift a finger to help him.

"Are you alright, Charles?"

Returning to Earth from his spacing out, Choudhury faces Matkins again. "W-what?"

"You keep looking at me funny. Are you sure you're okay?"

"Y-yeah, sorry. I just, I just got lost in my thoughts," scouring his recollection of his Foundation training, he searches for some bullshit topic to talk about. "Just… you ever think about Tahiti?"

"Thinking about vacation, eh? Well, good on you, Charles. I hear that place is real nice; you deserve it."

"Thank you, Matkins."

The bus comes into view down the street. Larry dusts himself off and scrounges around in his pockets for the fare, coming up a dollar short. The bus nears as he turns to Choudhury. "Shoot. Could you break a five?"

Charles stands and pulls out his wallet from his back pocket, handing Matkins a plastic card. "Here. This should be good for half a year or so," he says as he hands him his company-issued ticket.

"Nah, no, I just need a dollar Char-"

"Just take it. Get yourself out of here, ride a jetski to Tahiti or something. We'll keep looking for you here for years if you slip up even a little."

Matkins holds the card up and gestures with it, waving it in the air a little to show appreciation. "Well, thank you very much, Charles Choudhury."

The bus pulls up to the stop and the door opens to reveal a set of steps. Its inside is cramped with dozens of strangers all vying for territory on this small, enclosed tube of transport. Matkins steps on and swipes Charles' card, getting a green light on the scanner. He looks back one last time at Choudhury.

"Take care, Charles. Take care."

"Thanks. Enjoy your retirement, Lawrence. You earned it."

With a gust of mechanized pistons, the bus doors shut as Larry started down the way to find an open spot on the handlebars since all the seats were taken up.

And the bus took off, rejoining its fellows in the stream of traffic along the San Joaquin main street. Charles, alone with his thoughts, unsure what to think of the situation, walked back to his thankfully unharassed truck just a slim twelve or so meters down the sidewalk.

He clicks the key fob, opens the door, and takes a comfortable seat on the fine leather he had barely taken care of. The weight of his body slowly, incrementally, fades away like seafoam.

Choudhury presses the start button and puts his foot on the break, activating the engine and lightly rustling the recording device hidden in the truck's front side grille.

Walking into the office building, the sign overhead reading "Southern California Petroleum", Choudhury looks around the small front desk area of this two-and-a-half-room building. Nothing. Nobody here, not even Triple-A to man the till. No customers either - paid or otherwise.

He looks around, searching for any clues as to why the others would break from protocol as his mind gradually starts leaping to conclusions.

Only when Choudhury stops does he see the store sign reading closed. It's always something right under your nose.

He sighs, half relieved that nobody saw him going in circles like a headless chicken, but while also checking around the parking lot to confirm that nobody had seen him and that there was no chance that anyone who had seen him dancing like an idiot could have left before he started looking for them. His checking is completed to his satisfaction.

Choudhury turns back around to see the top of a mop of bright blonde hair. He jolts back, realizing midway through the familiar sight before him.

"N-Naomi, hey, I, uh-"

"Good morning, Charles."

"… Morning."

Spinning around, Naomi heads back behind the front desk and into the small utility closet in the backroom. "Good news. Something popped up. Follow me."

Briefly caught off guard, Choudhury rushes to catch up with Naomi as he tries to figure out what is going on. "W-what? You mean with 5384?"

"With SCP-5384", Researcher Bradley chides as she pushes a box of pamphlets and user guides out of the way, revealing a lightly glowing number pad. She inputs a six-digit string, causing an audible chk as multiple electronic latches unlock. "And yes, I believe we may be onto something." A trapdoor opens, arcing its faux floor up and down in the top right corner, revealing a descending staircase leading to the real Site-48.

As per usual with Foundation regulation, OSHA would weep upon seeing this.

The two take turns going down the wobbly undermeasured steps as Naomi continues down the chill eggshell white hallway, leaving Choudhury to input his code into the system to shut the trapdoor once more. He hurries to catch up with her again.

Turning through an elaborate series of hallways and corners, passing doorframes, window panes, and the odd death row inmate being escorted by their coworkers, they delve deeper into the heart of the facility.

"So, what did you find?"

"There was a disturbance yesterday. Eight dead in a public transit accident. This way."

Choudhury stops.

"What?!"

Naomi turns to him for a moment. "Come on, you'll need to see the report for yourself."

Choudhury's blood runs cold as the muscles in his body burn bright. He follows along, now moving double time.

Eventually, they make it into a humanoid containment chamber, a room like most other rooms with the only difference being a one-way mirror at one end and a small plastic table in the center, besides the human amenities in the corners. Charles looks around for any signs of what Naomi could be referring to until she pulls out a paper and puts it on the table.

"Take a look."

Transcript 5384-5

Personnel Involved: Agent Charles Choudhury

Subject: SCP-5384

Location: Shaun Cavalry Park

Date: November 22, 2015: 6:17 PM

<Begin Log>

Footage takes place behind a metal grate, pointed outward, facing a clear line of sight up the sidewalk as the car ahead drives off. The camera remains here for twenty minutes until notable activity begins with Charles Choudhury stepping into the shot.

Agent Choudhury walks out from the park path and walks up the sidewalk as another, semi-obese figure moves beside him. The two take a seat at the bus stop and stay there for eight minutes, talking amongst themselves.

A bus approaches the stop. The figure stands and gets into position. Agent Choudhury stands as well and shakes SCP-5384's hand-

How does a bastard, orphan, son of a whore and a Scotsman dropped in the middle of a forgotten spot in the Carribean by providence impoverished in squalor, grow up to be a hero and a scholar?

"What the hell is this, Naomi?" Choudhury looks up from the document to see Researcher Bradley staring dead ahead through him. The bags under her eyes have cleared up, if only slightly.

"More than enough grounds for the termination of your employment with the SCP Foundation, Choudhury," she says as she pulls up a seat for herself. "You have undergone the same training as the rest of us. You should know better than to socialize with the items under our containment. It is shocking to me that you not only failed to alert anyone else of your discovery but that you aided SCP-5384 in its escape."

As she continues, she reaches over the table and takes the paper. "Charles, do I even have to describe just how unacceptable this decision was?" she pauses, apparently waiting for an answer.

"He didn't. He couldn't hurt anyone, Naomi."

"That's why I said accident. But you let him get away. Why did you let him get away, Charles?"

"He, he's harmless! Harmless! He, he couldn't-"

Bradley cuts in, her once tired eyes now cutting deep with a cold, dead-on stare. "You know better than this. Why did you let him leave?"

Flustered in his thoughts, Choudhury's mind tumbles from place to place, trying to think of some reasonable excuse while balancing stowing away the betrayal he felt by both this absurd violation and his supposed involvement in such an unlawful incident. He could not afford the same fate as the many other terminated personnel who had started their grovelling by aggressively confronting the situation.

"I-I, I don't, I can't, I-"

"Spit it out, Charles," annoyance clouds Researcher Bradley's face, an irritation that had been hidden away with make-up and a practiced patience only Foundation interviewers could achieve.

Silence crowds the room. Silence, and the ambient sounds of through-the-wall machinery and vent articulation. The only ones in the world are Charles and Researcher Bradley. She peers up at him. Time slows and hastens all at once, and Choudhury is the only one who can fix this self-contained anomaly.

Breath returns to Choudhury. He speaks, unsure entirely of the consequences he'd be facing for this. "I trusted him, alright, Naomi. I trusted him. I'm sorry. I'm, I'm so sorry," his mouth compels him to continue talking, already in motion, but his mind takes control once more. Charles finally takes a seat.

Quiet returns to the chamber, though this time, not dedicated purely to Choudhury. Researcher Bradley now shares in this burden. Taking her time, staring ahead, almost corpse-like at Charles, she makes no movement to address either's concerns.

"It's already been decided," her voice, slow, focused, and cold, fills the entire room like a void. "You are off the project. You will be transferred to Site-56. Any previously afforded privileges you have received will be revoked. Am I clear, Choudhury?"

"Yes, yes ma'am."

Bradley stands and heads for the door. Her high heels tap against the linoleum floor, creating an echoing series of markers to indicate her distance from Charles as his head falls to the table.

"You are very fortunate, Charles."

The door shuts.

The vagueness of Bradley's words only became apparent to Charles later on. Walking through the facility, a reverberating shame followed him as he went, those statements all muddled together and fragmented into stabbing memories that he tried to decypher for meaning.

But the final part of that scolding became clear when Choudhury stepped out from the basement site and into the front office. Outside, in Southern California Petroleum's parking lot, a deep red truck was getting towed. Emblazened on the tow truck's side were the words "Sanchez Car-care Providers."

Cursing and dashing through the small space, Choudhury gets stuck on the countertop door. Fiddling with it for dear life, he manages to get through. He bursts out of the building, but by that time, the tow had already made it out to the street. All he could do now was shout and curse the driver, but all the same, he was left on his ass as his Ram was shepherded away.

"Damn it all! Fuck!"

-

The afternoon flurry of traffic seemed so much louder from the pavement. Cars and vans going this and that way. This late in the day, how could there be so many people on the road? Where could they all be going at once? They move in and out of earshot, surely, though slowly, disappearing into white noise as those same words rang relentlessly in his ears.

Stuck at the bus stop again, a suitcase at either side, Choudhury's mind wanders amidst the fragmented members of his psyche for a solution to what events had just transpired. Images of Matkins' charming smile or Naomi's disappointed face manifest and give way to the next troubling thought.

Those same scenes return to him as the coming express comes into view for the fellows beside him. A piece of some kind of paper folds up. Absent-mindedly, Choudhury's body reaches for his bags as his mind replays those visions.

-

The weathered wooden furniture once sanded down to a fine enough luster, quickly becomes uncomfortable as the table drops its clean facade, releasing an infestation of ants across its surface. Choudhury reels back, his hands briefly arcing above his head. Larry laughs as he leans down, propping up his bottom jaw to get a better look at the newcomers.

"Neat, ain't they?" he says while drawing out a half-eaten slice of bread. A few torn pieces strew about the table. "They work smart, hard, and together to make it through."

His lenient smile dips. "But that's all they'll ever know. Working to survive is hardwired into their very biology - support the colony and depend on the queen. Like factory workers and those who keep the lights on and mouths fed - those who sign the checks."

"It's a crummy cycle, but it works. Why break from it?" Choudhury says, his initial excitement from the suddenness numbing to a slowness to match Matkins' tenor.

"Mmm. Maybe so, but change happens. Whether that's good or bad, I can't say, but I think I'd like to see more of it," Larry stands and dusts himself off, inspiring Choudhury to do the same.

"A couple months into your retirement and you're already getting sentimental," Choudhury chimes in. He puts his phone back into his pocket, the opened app on the turned-off device once giving him the option to notify Naomi.

"Maybe. But it's good to keep some things close to heart," he says. "Come on Charles, let's get out of here."

-

Thinking back to these moments, Choudhury sees nothing but misfortune as he boards the bus, navigating his way through the crowded aisle of civic plantation to reach the felted fold-up seat beside a window. He sets his bags down by his shoes as he awkwardly scoots past a sleeping stranger to have a rest for the long journey ahead.

He leans on the window as regret washes over him. His mind mentally demands an answer nobody can answer but himself. Over and over the same questions ring out and trickle like all-encompassing wind chimes. Why? How could I? What is wrong with me?

And of course, there was no one to blame but himself. Pinning that scorn on Naomi would be unjust since she was right. Harping on Matkins - Charles let him escape! Let him run away and do what he did. Is all that blood on my hands?

-

An hour later the anger has subsided, replaced now only with miserable memories of things impossible to fix. He peers out the window and sees an unfamiliar part of the city. Cars, trucks, vans, taxis, and all sorts of other automobile nonsense litter the streets around the bus as it slows to slot into the congested traffic. Still an hour (Or three, considering the line-up ahead) out from '56.

With nothing else to do, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his Foundation-issued cell phone. He scrolls through a few apps, trying to find a disconnect from reality. While his life was being turned upside down, everything was just the same for everyone else around him. Better for them, even. Smiles all around.

He checks a few other apps, his eyes slowly closing as he goes along, before he stumbles onto his contacts list. He only had five or so people in there.

Upon being met with a blankness under the N category, the phone was shut off and hurled back into his pocket. The nearest fellow passenger of the blue-stained seating arrangement turned his head as a quiet sobbing began.

Ruminating some more, Charles questions what the point was of even looking.