I wanted to find a small hole where I could curl up and cry.

Two hours. I had waited two hours for my flight to be cancelled. And forget the small hole. I could already feel my eyes start to prickle and itch. Two hours. That was eighty pages of Brina Kostan's newest novel. That was six episodes of Pop Pop Bang.

"Are you all right?"

I jumped at the stranger's touch and shrugged his hand off my shoulder.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to startle you."

Warily, I turned towards the man's voice.

The terminal was full of businessmen in black suits, crying children suckling on their mother's teat, with a vast faceless many. But people still disappeared at airports. Even with all of the uniformed security. Even with all of the hi-tech cameras, young women were still snatched up and sold in dark markets hidden away down still darker streets.

And I felt my heart melt at the sight of the young man. He had a face that belonged on a magazine cover and wavy blonde hair that would not have seemed out of place in a fantasy novel.

"N-not at all," I said. I rubbed away my errant tears before they could embarrass me. "I'm sorry."

"No, no," the young man said with a flash of white teeth. "Your flight was cancelled, too?"

I glanced over at the massive monitor, but my flight's cancellation had already disappeared from the list.

"All of the f-flights to Chersov," I said, softly. "Cancelled."

I could feel the same shameful tears well up behind my eyes, but I willed them dry. I would simply die if I had a breakdown in-front of an honest-to-god male model.

"Blame the Khavasks," the young man said, and his words hardened. "It wasn't enough that they dropped a bomb on their neighbor. Now they're shooting planes out of the sky."

I shrank away from the violence in his voice. It was all anyone talked about nowadays. Death and violence and radiation. All I wanted were my books and my shows and, one day, my Prince Charming. Everything else seemed like a distraction.

The young man must have noticed my discomfort for his expression softened. I shivered as he rested a hand on my shoulder, but I did not pull away. I still had Prince Charming on my mind, and I wanted to be hopeful.

"You know, since my flight was cancelled I was going to head into the city for dinner. I know its sudden, but would you like to join me?"

I nodded, perhaps too eagerly. But the young man was so handsome. I scarcely even noticed the unusual glint to his teeth as he smiled widely.

"I'm jealous that you can pack so light," Foma said as he hefted my backpack into the trunk of the taxi. We had exchanged names and a few laughs as we had navigated the airport's hectic departure hall.

"I d-don't need much," I said, my face still beet red from Foma's company.

"That is happiness," Foma said, and he opened the taxi door for me. Only then did I realize how close the two of us would be. Never mind that I had not taken a bath or washed my hair since the day before.

"Come on," Foma said with a chuckle. He offered me a small push towards the open car door. "It's too cold to stand around outside."

He was right. My face was so flushed with confusion and giddiness that I scarcely even realized how brisk it was until the taxi's heat slapped me in the face. I shimmied over the car seats and looked out at the night-lit city as if in a trance. My flight had been cancelled and yet it felt like I had arrived at an exotic destination all the same.

Foma slid in after me, and I blushed at our closeness. The taxi was small, and Foma's shoulders were broad and full.

The taxi purred to life as soon as the door was closed. We sped off down the road, lights flashing by in a mysticism of color. Foma offered a few words over the rumble of the car and the road, but I did not hear them.

My earlier excitement, my fairy-tale dreams of a Prince Charming, the heat that filled me with elation, all of it seemed to cool and die. Because Foma stank. Not like rancid eggs. Not like spoiled milk. But however handsome he may have been, with the two of us close and alone, I almost wanted to gag.

"Everything... all right?" Foma asked.

"You k-know..." I bit my lip. The car moved along in noisy disregard to my discovery. "I think... I m-may want to go... back."

"Back?" Foma wrapped a strong hand around my shoulder, but rather than fill me with delight like before, his touch felt clammy and cold as if his skin was covered in reptilian scales. "What do you mean?"

"To t-the airport," I said, though a quiet misery had crept into my thoughts. "I'd like to go b-back."

Foma and the taxi driver exchanged a look, and my heart sank.

"Don't you worry," Foma said. "We're not too far from the restaurant. Best seafood in the city."

"But I want t-to go back," I said.

"And we're not going back," Foma said. His words lost all veneer of civility and grace. "So don't worry about it."

"I'mnot worriedabout it," I said as a black pall fell over my thoughts. "I justw̵a̵n̴t̵ to- "

A loud crack filled the cramped taxi as Foma slapped me across the face.

"Don't worry about it," Foma said as my cheek stung with the grey b̸̦̆r̴̖̕i̴̩̾m̴͖̏s̵̞͠t̵͎͐ö̷͇n̷̪̉ĕ̷̫ of his lies.

[ soOo fuUll oOof d̷e̶c̸e̶i̶t̸ aNd aRtificE anD liEs. ]

"What is wrong with this girl?!" the taxi driver cried out.

Foma slapped me across the face, but he could not slap me across the face.

I gnawed on his hand, but it filled my m̷̺̍o̶̼̓ȗ̴͕t̷̰̎h̸̢͌ with ash, so I spat it out. He would not stop screaming, s̸c̷r̴e̸a̷m̸i̷n̷g̶, screaming.

I stopped the taxi because I wanted it to stop and the taxi stopped, but it was so hot and I could feel my clothes crinkle into a̸s̷h̷ as the fire tickled my chin.

There were other cars and more fire, and I saw a woman that I liked. She had a cigarette in her mouth in a mouth full of a̸s̷h̷ and I wanted to be her, so I took her cigarette and her clothes and when she wouldn't stop screaming I made her stop s̸c̵r̵e̶a̴m̵i̴n̴g̸.

"What is going on here?!"

A large man rushed over from across the street, alarm written clear across his face. He looked frantically between the blazing taxi and the naked woman in-front of me with a slack jaw.

"None of ya business, is what," I said, and I stomped towards the round lump of flesh with a grey fire in my belly. "All you need ta know is that you're my new chauffeur cuz' I don't know how to ride these metal carriages."

Complete confusion filled the man's face, so I smacked it out of his ears along with a few grams of fat.

"I'm not the repeating type," Urska said as the fat man started to weep over her new shoes. "You're driving me to Solca. I'm not keepin' my Prince Charming waitin' even a day longer."