Roz’s breath comes in quick white puffs. The cool midnight air stinging his lungs as he runs down the ice slick, sidewalks of Chicago. He clutches at the adder stone in his pocket even though his fingers are so cold he can no longer feel them. Every sound makes him jump. His eyes flick to each shadow. Roz gulps in air like like the atmosphere is going to dry up.

Focusing on moving from one patch of moonlight to the next, Roz sprints and weaves through streetlights and parked cars. He’s starting to get desperate. Maybe, he won’t reach his destination.

He shudders at the thought.

The stark shafts of moonlight begin to flicker as thready clouds drift in front of the moon’s face. Roz’s heart hastens as does his feet. He can’t be caught here.

Roz looks ahead at the brutalist, concrete and metal structure of the L. It casts an inky black shadow beneath it, a solid line stretching unbroken in both directions. He slows as he approaches the barrier, squinting at the soft yellow lights that dot the underside of tracks.

Squeezing the adder stone in his pocket once more, Roz draws his hands out of his pockets and rubs them together. He focuses on the itchy drag of his wool, half-finger gloves. One breath in. One breath out.

He toes into the shadow of the L, almost slipping on black ice as he crosses the street. His eyes fixate on the next patch of moonlight on the other side of the street, pale and bright. The only sound he can hear are his boots crunching on the frosted asphalt. He glances around. There is no one else on the street. He can’t hear any cars or even the buzz electric streetlights.

His gaze returns to the moonlight. He’s halfway there, but the light is beginning to flicker. It’s the middle of winter. He should have known that the thready clouds were a sign of much more substantial winter ones. Down the street, he could see the phantom shadows blocking the moonlight becoming thicker and more opaque. Soon a wall of black shadow was drifting down the street. A sign of a large storm system moving in to block the moonlight out.

Roz digs his toes into the ground and breaks into another sprint, determined to get ahead of the weather. Watching as the gentle system of clouds floats towards him and blocks out the moonlight, he begins to panic as the wind blows harder.

In his worry, he makes a mistake. Roz’s boot lands on a slick spot of concrete and his shoulder hits the ground. He hisses in pain as he feels the cold seep in through his denim jacket. He plants his fingers on the ground and moves to push up of the ground when he watches the moonlight get wiped away before him.

The city street grows dark, the soft, yellow lights illuminating only patches of the empty street. Roz’s breath comes quick. He jams his hand into his packet and pulls out the stone, bringing it to his eye. He squints through the small hole, checking his surroundings. Where is the damn thing?

A yellow light flickers out near where Roz had come from. The few lights left on in the storefront lights on the street were quietly snuffed out. Roz looks wildly around through his adder stone. Left. Right. Behind him. From above---

The yellow bulb above Roz bursts! Sparks shower down and Roz’s shoulders jackknife and the adder stone flings from his grip. Little flecks of razor sharp glass rain down on Roz’s jacket and skitter across the pavement all around him.

Roz lunges after the adder stone, feeling glass stick to his eyelashes. He swipes frantically across the pavement looking for the small object. Small cuts form in the palm of his hand as he goes, hot blood welling up and smearing across the ground.

His fingers bump against a smooth object, sending it skudding across the ground further away from him. Getting up on all fours, Roz crawls to it.

Soft yellow lights burst and go out, one exploding before all the pieces of the previous one have hit the ground. Static reeds through the air, biting at the little hairs on Roz’s limbs beneath his clothes.

Roz grasps the adder stone and clutches it tight as he brings it close to his body. The last light goes out and he is plunged into unnatural darkness. He brings the stone up to his eye and squints through but it is too dark to see anything.

He sits frozen in the empty silence, unable to see a thing.

The winter wind shudders between the buildings like a death rattle wheezing out through the rusty fire escapes. Roz’s muscles tighten, feeling like they are going to freeze in the bitter cold. His ears twitch as he strains to hear.

A cold hand snaps closed around his ankle, burning like an iron shackle, and it yanks. Roz is pulled down the street, back the way he came. The denim jacket rides up with force, dragging his t-shirt with it. The asphalt scrapes over his back, leaving what Roz knows will be a nasty road rash.

Roz grunts and flings his body forward, crunching his abdomen so he can grip at the monster pulling him away in the darkness. He struggles against the force pulling him across the ground like a roller coaster car. His hands attempt to seize the monster but all he feels is his own boot.

A glint of moonlight lights the world for a fraction of a second and Roz sees his destination. The warped glass window of a laundromat. However, when the beast flings his body through the glass, Roz knows he will not be waking up in front of a washer or dryer.

The world goes dark again and Roz makes a grab for the handle of a car door. He grips it for dear life and feels his boot get tugged on even harder. The car rocks on its tires and he can hear the metal of the frame creak as they both get tugged on. The car’s burglar alarm goes off and in the flashing yellow lights, Roz can almost make out the outline of long fingers curled around his calf. With the flashing lights, comes the silence shattering noise of the car horn going off.

The monster tugs harder and Roz’s fingers slip from the car door. He hits the ground hard bouncing and skidding across the ground as he’s dragged faster down the street, wind whistling in his ears.

Roz holds his breath. He braces for his fate, praying that someone else can---

He suddenly finds himself squinting in a moonlit street. The bright white light clear as the middle of the day. The invisible hand releases him and his heel hits the ground. His momentum carries his body all the way to the laundromat, the soles of his boots hitting the wall of the building.

Roz looks up and sees his own reflection in the smooth storefront glass. He lets out a breath and gulps in a few more handfuls of air before looking straight into the face of the moon. The rays of light shine with an iridescence that make Roz’s eyes water.

Keep going. A voice rings inside Roz’s skull. Find the gatekeeper.

Roz groans and gets to his feet. He rights his thin clothing, the fabric sticking to the blood and grains of street, then glances at the sky.

The cloud system is swirling, seemingly fighting with some similar force. He looks at the path ahead of him and sees a path of clear sky parting just for him.

Letting out a sputtering sigh and stretching out his sore shoulder, Roz breaks out into another sprint, hoping that the moon will light the rest of his way to Luisillo’s Diner.