“Now, this is the story all about how, my life got flipped, turned upside down~.” Singing along to the lyrics of the iconic song that appeared in his randomized music playlist, Foster Locke stepped off his bike. He pulled his backpack to the front of his body to grab the lock attached to it.

Just when he leaned forward to bind it around the metal pole in front of his workplace, his coworker hit the back of his head lightly to get his attention, “Yo, fresh prince. Early for once, huh?” He laughed, and Foster slowly turned around to see what kind of son of a bit-

“Oh, morning, dude.” Foster replied with a fake smile and looked his coworker Jeremy up and down. Like usual, Jeremy was wearing a random anime-themed Hot Topic shirt underneath his bright red sweater jacket, paired with some blue jeans without a belt. That, however, made them always hang halfway underneath his ass, something you simply don’t want to see. At least Foster didn’t.

His worn-out Converse were still covered muddy from his daily traversal through the park between the bookshop and his house.

Jeremy wasn’t a bad guy, but in Foster’s opinion, he always acted a little too overfamiliar. Sure, they went to the same high school, but they never even spoke to each other then. It took Foster half a year, and seeing Jeremy inside of their old high school's ‘Go Panthers!’ hoodie, to realize that he did indeed meet him before.

Foster tried to answer Jeremy’s question as quickly as possible. He didn’t want to be pulled into another conversation about whatever comic Jeremy recently started to read. So Foster pulled down his jacket’s hood and smiled a bit. “I just did the regular stuff, you know? I went to bed early, woke up at 7, had a hot cup of coffee, and rushed over here.”

Technically, this wasn’t a complete lie. Nobody could deny that 5am was early. Yesterday’s leftover cup of coffee that he tried heating up in his microwave was indeed hot for a couple of sips. Hot enough to burn the tip of his tongue. At least after that, the coffee was so cold that he could use it to cool it. He just had to hurry, because he fell asleep again after waking up at 7.

“Ah, man, you’re getting responsible these days, heh?” Jeremy laughed a bit, and Foster couldn’t help himself but roll his eyes. He was late once, but Jeremy kept pretending that he was late every single day. Foster nodded his head and finally pulled his prized possession off his head. The black wireless over-ear headphones that his Grandfather bought him for Christmas three years ago.

Foster treated these as if they were more expensive than his whole apartment! Because they were. His rent was a little less than these headphones probably cost his Grandfather back then. They were the last present that he got from him, so he tried to treat them well, and never let them out of his sight ever. That was just in case some blind guy thought he should take a hit at being a thief and mistook his one-room apartment with a shared bathroom for a penthouse.

With the headphones around his neck, Foster finally twisted his key into the bike lock and then followed Jeremy into the bookshop. Luckily there wasn’t that much going on around this time of the day because it was a Wednesday morning, and Foster could leisurely make his way into the staff room. He changed into his work T-Shirt and then started sorting in the assortment of new books that arrived every Tuesday night into the shelves without anyone bothering him too much.

There were some terrific songs in this new playlist, so he wanted to listen to them some more. Foster’s boss was pretty chill like that, so as long as he tried to make sure he was accessible to customers that might need his help, he was allowed to listen to some music.

As Foster made his way into the staff room, he immediately stepped up to his locker and opened it up. He didn’t even know why the hell they were using these things. They were so dented that it seemed like his boss picked them up from the trash after they were run over a dozen times, and the locks didn’t even work. He couldn’t actually close the locker’s door most of the time he was trying to.

But it wasn’t like there was anything in there that actually mattered to Foster. He had his headphones, regular phone, wallet, and keys on his person at all times. All that was in his backpack now were his shirt, running shoes, a bottle of water, and some candy that he bought on sale after Halloween.

Foster slowly pulled his headphones back over his ears and pulled out his phone to start the next track again while trying to kick the locker-door shut, and then made his way into the storage room.

His boss’ office was directly next to that, so he just quickly went in there to pick up the notes on which books should be displayed where today.

He picked up one of the boxes with new books. He brought it over toward the staff room, where Jeremy was still trying to put on his way too short and tight work T-Shirt. Foster placed the box down in front of him and fiddled with the staple holding the sheets together. Foster tried to tell his boss to use paperclips all the time because it was annoying to pull the staple out each and every time, but after the third time, he just gave up.

Once he finally got it out, he handed one of the sheets to Jeremy. He took the other three himself while looking down at the box, “Manga, Visual Novels, et cetera. Please try to get it done before lunch this time.”

“Got it.” Jeremy said excitedly and immediately proceeded to just squat down and open the box in front of him up to take a peek at what everything was. Foster just sighed deeply and took a look at the rest of the sheets of paper to see what he needed to get done.

He made his way back into the storage and stacked three of the boxes up on top of each other, since it would be faster this way, and then pushed the pieces of paper in between two of those boxes so that they wouldn’t fall down.

Foster hurried up and stepped back out into the store’s main space, before making his way over toward the first section, the one for young women. He got to work sorting everything in, taking a break two or three times to help customers out and was soon finished with this part of his job.

While he was at it, Foster also re-sorted some of the books that people placed into the wrong section and refilled the parts of the shelves that were currently empty. Foster pulled out a leatherbound copy of ‘Frankenstein.’ It was a good book, just that it was stuffed inbetween ‘Winnie the Pooh’ and one of those random no-name educational children’s books that you could find anywhere. Just then, he happened to spot a rather troublesome person.

She was a young woman, with 21 just a year older than Foster, but she had her life completely under control. She had a good fashion sense, was popular, went to a nearby college, and most importantly... Claire was one of the best-looking women that Foster knew... And his ex-girlfriend.

And in the next moment, he didn’t spot her anymore. That was because, without hesitation, Foster turned around and tried to pretend he never saw her. Luckily he couldn’t go back 10 years in time and try the same then, but he was working on it. If he could make a time machine out of an old microwave, then he had all that he needed.

“Foster!” Claire exclaimed loudly, screaming through the whole store, and the man in question turned around immediately to give her a death-stare.

“What are you doing? I’m at work.” He told Claire as he approached her, pulling her to the side quietly, “I know, that’s why I came here.” Claire pointed out, crossing her arms with a light smile, “Why didn’t you come to the course yesterday? I thought I told you to!” She said playfully, hitting Foster’s arm as she was doing so.

But as Foster was slightly rubbing his arm while trying to pretend he wasn’t, he just stared back at the girl whose face was covered in streaks of her bright blonde hair. Sometimes he wondered if she was the one that all those blonde-jokes were about.

“Because my boss only covers the Gym’s general fees, which is kind enough already, and I can’t afford to pay extra for the courses.” Foster tried to explain to Claire like a dozen times before already, but she still didn’t really understand it.

“The course is just 10$ a month, what do you mean?” She asked with a confused expression, and Foster returned the same face toward her, “10$ a month? It’s 10$ a WEEK, Claire, not a month. Because they only have course packages there. And even if I wasn’t in debt and could afford it, I wouldn’t have the time. I’ve told you that so often.” Foster pointed out, really not in the mood to entertain Claire all that much this morning.

The young woman looked at him with a deep frown and crossed her arms, “Well, you go to the gym nearly every day.”

“That’s because it’s five minutes away from here, and I have four hours between my morning and my evening shift. That’s why.” Foster pointed out as he started to walk away to keep working, but was swiftly followed by Claire.

“Come on, we really need you there! There’s this competition next month, and-“

“Claire, please, just stop. I haven’t even properly practiced in a year. I know that I'm rude, but could you maybe just leave?” He asked of her, and with a slight frown, Claire turned around, “Fine. If I’m not wanted here, I’ll leave. I just wanted to be nice.” She said and immediately stormed toward the entrance.

While Foster did pretty guilty now, he figured that this was for the best anyway. He wasn’t feeling great having to see Claire all the time after she broke up with him anyway, but that was just the type of person she was. There wasn’t much Foster could really change about that. It’s what made him fall in love with her back then in the first place.

With a quiet grumble and his mood soured, Foster turned around again. He finally brought the copy of Frankenstein to the ‘Classics’ section. Now, Foster could work in peace, go on his run after his morning shift, head to the gym afterward. After his workout, he could take a shower there before heading back here to read a bit before his evening shift started.

Luckily, the rest of the day passed as uneventfully as Foster liked it to. Sure, it got a bit busier in the afternoon when the local school’s classes were over, and he had to bother with that rude new girl that always took over for Jeremy in the evening. Still, other than that, he was fine.

He could clean a bit, sort the books, spend some time reading and listening to music, and then just headed back to the staff room after clearing up for the day. And just when he wanted to put his backpack on, his boss entered the staff room.

“Ah, perfect. Foster, can I speak to you for a second?” He asked, seemingly relieved to see that Foster didn’t leave yet, and the young man turned toward his boss with a puzzled expression, “Sure, what’s wrong?” He asked, pulling his headphones off his head again, and the nervous boss just averted his gaze that he wouldn’t meet Foster’s.

“I actually have something important happening later tonight, but we are still missing the new ‘Jane Merriot’ books that were supposed to be delivered yesterday. They said they’ll bring them immediately, but someone has to be here to receive them. I would appreciate it if you could stay and lock up after the delivery.” Foster’s boss explained. With a bit of confusion, Foster himself just slightly sighed.

“When are they supposed to get here?” He asked, so with a bright smile, his boss started taking out one of his keys, “Ten, at the very latest. Thank you so much. You can take tomorrow morning off if you like. Fully paid, of course.”

Surprised, Foster raised his brows and nodded his head with appreciation, “Oh, thank you! That would be great!” He exclaimed. Finally, he would be able to catch up on all that sleep he lost lately. And if they really got here at 10, then he’s smoothly going to make it to the train station before the last train.

Foster received the key with a smile, letting his backpack slide off his back as he stepped through the store. He sat down on the stool behind the counter, placing his elbows down on it to watch something on his phone as he waited. Soon, Foster’s boss left, and he was left to wait for a little while.

He was feeling pretty tired, so Foster was trying to do some basic warm-up exercises to keep himself from falling asleep like this. But before he knew it, 10pm rolled around. And then 10:30, and at last 11pm.

At least they got there at 11:20, and Foster quickly signed whatever he needed and hurried up to lock any entrance there was and stepped outside. He made sure he had everything he needed with him and locked the front door as well before throwing the key into the mailbox next to the entrance. Like this, his boss could retrieve it tomorrow morning.

But just when he turned around, he noticed something peculiar. The spot where he had placed his old, rusty bike for the past year every single day... was empty.

“Don’t fucking tell me...” Foster muttered quietly and took a look around, before he found his bike-lock on the ground after being cracked open, “Oh fuck me!” He exclaimed and immediately pulled out his phone to check the time.

“Alright, I still have thirty minutes...” He whispered, and then opened his backpacks to take his running shoes out, since his boots weren’t really made for that, wrapped his shoes in his towel and placed them into his bag. Foster immediately started booking it into the direction of the closest station so that he could catch the last train of the night.

He worked in a pretty small town, so it only had one station, and he couldn’t really afford a taxi or Uber, so if he missed this train, he was basically fucked. Because he couldn’t really get across the river toward the city, he actually lived in otherwise.

And so, Foster did his best to run and run and run until he reached the station and could swipe his one-month-card through the machine, before sprinting up the stairs as quickly as possible.

He thought he was just on time, but the small panel hanging by the doorway said that the train was actually running late.

With a relieved sigh, Foster sat down on one of the metal-grate seats and placed his face into his hands, thinking about how bothersome this whole situation was. He leaned backward, and for just a few moments, closed his eyes to think about where he could get a new bike.

Foster seemed to have dozed off for one of those few moments, but soon he saw a bright light in front of his eyes, which had to be the train. So, he tried his best to make his tired ass stand up as he rubbed his eyes.

But when he looked in front of himself, what Foster saw wasn’t the lit-up interior of the train. Rather two bright, moving circles, that disappeared just for a split second before reappearing instantly.

Warm wind, or rather a moist breath, hit Foster’s face as his brain slowly started to catch up to what was happening. His first thought was ‘What is that?’, albeit many times more chaotically. Luckily, there was something that let him know together with a bell’s ringing.

[Fervent Lunacide – LV. ???]