~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
For 20 advanced chapters, visit my Patreon:
spatreon/Twilight_scribe1
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dinner that night was a delivered pizza with a complintary two-liter bottle of soda—good ol' high-fructose happiness.
Looking at the greasy box and the oversized soda, Henry couldn't help but think: No wonder Aricans keep getting bigger. It wasn't just a stereotype—it was practically engineered. Food here was cheap, dense, and designed to hit every craving center in the brain.
And it wasn't like the rest of the world didn't have shut-ins and couch potatoes, but Arica had a unique breed: the "can't-leave-their-bed" level of sedentary. Guys tipping the scales at hundreds of pounds who had to be lifted by crane or fire departnt assistance just to see daylight.
Of course, on the flip side, this epidemic had been a goldmine for gyms, personal trainers, and wellness industries. Rich folks especially—the ones who had ti to sculpt their bodies between stock trades and yoga classes—kept the fitness economy humming.
Then there were the gym rats—the kind who lived for reps, protein shakes, and questionable steroids. A whole separate evolutionary branch.
Henry suddenly rembered that one Avengers film where Thor let himself go and turned into a beer-gutted, sweatpants-wearing shadow of a god.
The mory made him glance down at his own stomach.
Does Kryptonian physiology prevent obesity? he wondered grimly.
But the hunger was real. After years in that Russian blacksite—where he'd once been so starved he nearly considered scraping plaster off the walls for a snack—Henry wasn't about to let a hot al go to waste.
He took a bite.
And imdiately regretted it.
Now, Henry wasn't picky. Never had been. As long as food was edible, he'd eat it. But this? This pizza tasted like it had lost a fight with a tire fire and been drowned in regret. The cheese was rubbery, the sauce suspiciously sweet, and the crust had the texture of wet cardboard.
He swallowed out of principle.
There were now four categories of food in his mind:
Delicious. Edible. Inedible.
And now a fourth: "Edible but emotionally damaging."
This pizza belonged squarely in that fourth category. Throwing it away felt wasteful. Eating it felt like betrayal.
And with his heightened Kryptonian taste buds, it was even worse. The flavors were too vivid. Every rancid oil and fake tomato tang was dialed up to eleven.
No wonder they gave you two liters of soda with this crap, he thought, chugging the cola like mouthwash.
From now on, one thing was clear: wherever he rented, it needed to have a kitchen. If eating out was going to taste like this, he'd be better off cooking for himself.
If Yelp existed in 1990, Henry would've rage-reviewed this place into the ground with a solid one-star rating and a scathing paragraph.
To distract himself, he pulled the motel's Yellow Pages out from under the phone and flipped through, looking for tomorrow's to-do list. No internet. No reviews. No ratings. Just bold nas, addresses, and hopeful ad slogans.
Trial and error, then.
He sighed. Well, if you're going to play in a new city, you've gotta be willing to lose a few gas.
As long as he played it smart—no greed, no unnecessary risks—he could pull out before anything got too ssy.
And if anyone tried to solve problems with violence?
He grinned.
Let 'em try.
He was Kryptonian, after all.
---
The next morning, Henry stepped outside into the crisp L.A. winter sun. The rays weren't as harsh as in sumr—gentle, warm, almost coaxing. Unlike sumr's blazing death orb, winter sunshine invited you out. Made you want to follow it.
Unfortunately, L.A. also ca with industrial smog and years of being an urban jungle. Deep breaths weren't refreshing; they were a gamble. Every inhale ca with a question mark—is that a lungful of oxygen or exhaust fus?
He cleaned himself up, threw on a fresh shirt, and hit the street.
Breakfast ca from a hot dog stand run by a grinning old Black man who handed over a loaded dog drowned in mustard. It wasn't gourt, but it did the job. He even offered a soda with it—which Henry politely declined.
The stuff looked like it ca straight from a bacteria petri dish. He'd seen less alarming fluids in alien experints.
Stomach settled, Henry's next priority was the money.
He'd been walking around with tens of thousands in cash on him—most of it cramd into that small, overstuffed backpack. Not ideal. Not safe. Not sustainable.
Stashing it in a motel room or a future rental wasn't smart either. Too easy for soone to break in, or for the whole place to burn down in one of L.A.'s charming little structure fires.
No—he needed a bank.
He hadn't opened an account in Alaska for a reason. The local banks up there were mostly isolated. Sure, they'd take your money, but good luck accessing it once you hit the lower 48. And converting a check from an Alaskan bank into cash on the mainland? That was a roulette wheel of fees and red tape.
Now that he was aiming for sothing real in L.A.—maybe even stepping into the Hollywood circuit—he had to play the part. Cashing checks or handling paynts without a real bank account would turn into a headache fast.
Small banks? Too sketchy.
Too many of them were traps—dressed up with high interest rates and "personal touch" marketing, but once you signed up, you were at their rcy. Hidden fees, nonsense policies, impossible custor service.
And the big boys? Not exactly trustworthy either.
He rembered all too clearly the news headlines from his old world: Barings Bank. Lehman Brothers. Silicon Valley Bank. All massive institutions that crumbled spectacularly—each collapse sounding alarms even for people who didn't know a bond from a baguette.
If you weren't in the system with insider knowledge, you were just another sheep lining up for shearing.
But today, driving through the streets, he spotted a Citibank branch.
Big. Visible. Predictable.
Sotis, that was all you needed.
He parked, grabbed his bag (money still weighing it down like bricks), and stepped out into the morning sun.
Ti to get his na—well, a na—on the books.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
📢 Notice for My Amazing Patrons!
Hey everyone! Just a quick heads-up—today's update will be a little later than usual due to extra polishing. But don't worry, it's coming!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
User Comments
0 comments from readers