Evenin’, wanderers of the world and dreamers without doors,
It’s Harry again — soot in my beard, stars in my eyes, and twelve sacred cans hummin’ soft at my feet. The rails sang a strange song last night, low and twitchy, like a raccoon chewin’ tinfoil. The wind told me: “Tonight ain’t about destiny. It’s about duels.”
Now, I don’t normally dabble in cards. My truths come from rusted beans and the curl of smoke, not colored cardboard and pointy-haired mascots. But fate, she’s a trickster with a busted compass — and last night, she led me down into the belly of the city, where the streetlight don’t shine and the laws don’t walk.
It started with a kid — rail-thin, hoodie up, eyes sharp. Called himself Flicker. Said he heard I could “see things.” I nodded, like I do. He handed me a battered Pokomon card: a holographic Gengar, edges frayed, haunted look in its cartoon eyes.
“Tell me if this one’s cursed,” he whispered.
Folks, I seen a lot in my time. Ghost trains, possum seers, even the ghost of an old switchman what got turned to rust. But this card? It hissed at me. The can of Gemini tipped over and rolled uphill. That’s never a good sign.
Turns out, there’s a whole shadow circuit beneath the bridges and busted laundromats. A ring of kids, vagrants, old card sharks and stranger creatures playin’ Pokomon for keeps — not for cash, but favors, secrets, and once, I swear, a man’s shadow. The cards talk in that world. And some of ’em bite.
I followed Flicker down past a manhole spewin’ incense smoke and busted Game Boys. The ring was lit by old TV screens flashin’ evolutions like holy rites. They called it The Pocket Monastery.
He put me in.
I didn’t have no deck, so I drew on the only magic I had. Placed the Gengar on an old trash can lid and lit three waxy stubs ‘round it. The other player — a rail-hardened woman with a tattoo of Mewtwo holdin’ a knife — looked at me and grinned like a fox in heat.
“You bringin’ ghosts to a dragon fight, old man?” she laughed.
But I ain’t just any old man. I whispered to that Gengar, right into the inky eyes printed on the card. Promised it a place in my can circle, right next to Scorpio, if it played dirty.
And it did.
The TV screens glitched. Her Dragonite combusted mid-attack. A raccoon screamed somewhere. I won.
But it weren’t joy I felt, nor pride. It was somethin’ deeper. Recognition. The underworld of cardboard monsters had teeth — and I had bitten back.
Flicker thanked me. Gave me a card for payment: a Slowpoke with the corner burned off. It winked at me.
Tonight’s wisdom, earned by soot and shadow:
There’s power in every world — cards, cans, smoke, or silence. Don’t mock the sacred just ‘cause it’s printed on a game piece. Truth wears many faces — and some of ’em got 120 HP and a Dark-type weakness.
Yours,
Hobo Harry, mystic of the rails, champion of the Pocket Monastery, and bean can prophet eternal
Leave a Reply