by Michaelsun Knapp
Mr. Grey got up from his plush seat to walk to the lavish bathroom on the train moving above the streets Paris. He was sorely tempted to leap onto an overstuffed chair, fire once or twice into the air with a gun he didn’t have, and shout from the top of his lungs that this was a stick up. And then to maybe shoot an innocent bystander to show how rightly serious he was.
But he didn’t. He grabbed his gloves, the only things he carried on the train, and strolled to the bathroom like a man whose only desire at the moment was to pee.
Once inside he locked the door behind him. His eye caught his reflection in the mirror as he turned. Everything was in place.
A HoloGraphic man appeared in front of Mr. Grey while his gaze swept past the marble stalls making certain that the bathroom was empty. It used to make him jump when HoloGraphics showed up, but now he just accepted it.
Damn advertisements, Mr. Grey thought, man can’t even use the bathroom in peace.
The HoloGraphic stayed a few paces in front of Mr. Grey; who made his way to double check that the bathroom really was as vacant as he suspected.
“Hello Mr. Kurasawa, would you like to hear the latest news on the tragedy in Adelmar?” The HoloGraphic asked.
Oh the news, Mr. Grey thought, much better. “No, I’m busy.” He said. His own voice sounded strange to him, like it was being stretched and pulled in ways it wasn’t used to. Which of course, it was, Mr. Grey wore a cream that blended with his skin, it was usually worn by women fretting about wrinkles, but when he put it on his throat it made his vocal cords shrink and stretch in odd places, and sounded like peppermint candy crushed under a boot.
“I understand.” the HoloGraphic said as Mr. Grey opened the first stall with the side of a closed fist “Do you need someone to talk to during these troubling times?” it asked, walking through the marble barriers as Mr. Grey opened the second stall the same way as he had the first.
He chuckled, shaking his head. Axis Mundi was really taking out all the stops trying to calm the masses. It didn’t make any sense to Mr. Grey. There wasn’t anything anyone could do to stop them. Axis Mundi was just too big. All anyone could do was create a little chaos, and, if they were lucky, make a tidy profit from it. “No.” he said to HoloGraphic “Thank you, but I’m very busy. If you wouldn’t mind, leave me alone.” He slammed open the third stall door the same as the others and found it just as empty.
The image bowed, hands at its side. “I understand Mr. Kurasawa. Have a good day.” And then it flickered out of existence.
Mr. Grey rolled his eyes and double checked that the door to the bathroom was locked before he took off his pants and his shirt revealing a tight fitting black suit with pulsing green lines.
Leaving his purposefully expensive, but common clothes on the sink, he turned the water on, soaking the fibers and washing away all of the sweat, hand oils and hair follicles he might have left.
He put on his gloves then put a finger to his ear and spoke into the microphone in his glove. “Anton. We’re good.”
As soon as the words left him a dark mist flowed rapidly from the ceiling descending to floor, like ink dropped into a glass of water. Mr. Faust prowled out of the already dissipating vapor towards Mr. Grey and made a show of looking Grey up and down. “Your onesie makes you look fat.” Mr. Faust said, half a smile making his right eye squint almost into a wink, and he tugged on his cracked leather jacket over his close fitting, black, tank top.
Mr. Grey just shook his head, chuckled, and asked “You ready?”
The handle to bathroom rattled, followed by a quick succession of knocks. “Hello?” A man’s voice called out. “Hello? Is anyone in there? Unlock the door.”
Mr. Faust, a good head and shoulders taller than most people, gave a toothy grin to his partner, mouthing “Oh yeah.” And then louder, to the man outside the door, he said “I’ll be out in a minute, Darling. No need to be so brash.” He didn’t even bother disguising his voice, which reminded Mr. Grey of sand rubbing over stone.
Mr. Grey managed to pull on his hood in between brief fits of quiet snickering. Green lights flashed around his collarbone and shoulders completing the circuits in the suit.
Then he faded from sight altogether, invisible.
Mr. Faust held up his fingers counting down from three, and when he curled his index down, he drop kicked the bathroom door open, slamming the guy up against the opposite wall.
A series of lightning-fast, inky, black clouds came down from the ceiling around guards whose necks were soon grabbed by Mr. Faust, and then broken as if they were nothing but pencils in the hands of a giant. Four died in the space of a few seconds.
Infectious panic quickly came to life in the passengers.
Mr. Grey, invisible to the naked eye, the eyes able to see infrared, ultraviolet, and pretty much anything else, strolled over to take a pistol off of one of the dead guard’s hips, and as he touched the gun the suit sent green smoky tendrils around the piece veiling it with the rest of Mr. Grey.
He then leapt onto a chair too filled with feathers, then he fired into the air a couple times, bringing on an instant, stillness to the train car as though everyone was suddenly made of plastic.
Mr. Grey held the silence for a moment, tasting it, savoring it. Then he shot a woman in the leg, causing her fall to the carpeted floor hard. She shattered the quiet like the leg he put a bullet into.
Mr. Grey then shouted from the top of his lungs “This is a stick-up.”
Originally published in Rind Literary Magazine — Issue 1 (August 2012).
Reposted February 1st, 2026
Vox Inaudica 