A Vagrant Story Read Online Free

show them what a bum can do. His foot hardly moved an inch when he heard Rum’s voice right beside him.
    “We going?” he said, rubbing his shoulder to health.
    “You stopped fighting?”
    Sierra followed Rum. “Sure we did. No point getting arrested over it. Time we headed home anyway.”
    On her lead they strolled away from the diner, cutting through a back road to avoid any main routes. The bars had closed, and that meant swarms of drunken louts were currently en-route home. Amazing the amount of attention a bum could get simply by standing on a brightly lit sidewalk. Drink did it to them mostly. So many people would come staggering from the bars eager for fights. Bums tended to be easy targets, and old Rum tended to be an easily swayed one.
    Their back road travels came under guidance from illuminating streetlights, flickering ominously against the darkened slabs of stone they called home. This was the only time one could appreciate this dump of a city for what it truly was, a dark dump of a city.
    Any fool knew it a bad idea to thread these back roads at this time of night. Muggings were an all too common occurrence and few people could walk without fear. These tramps, however, got along just fine. The threat factor came severely reduced since the main culprit resided in their own group. Sierra had been mugging since she was ten, and since then her skills provided a major source of income. Getting money rarely proved a problem, finding a place to spend it was the tricky part.
    Sierra kicked an empty beer can along the ground. “So sick of those people, who do they think they are throwing us out like that? It’s not like they’re so special to be eating in a kip like that.”
    “Maybe we should be more lenient toward them next time,” Alex said. “If you think about it we get most of our money from people like them, one way or the other. I suppose it sort of evens things out.”
    “Like karma,” Henry added.
    “That’s nothing to do with it. It’s just how people work. They put us down because they can. They cut us so we cut them back, always repeating - nothing more. ”
    “Aye, we spent the last of our cash in there, and the cider wasn’t even worth the price. I’m drunk, but just barely. Never even got through all of it, I hate leaving drink behind.”
    “That all you think about?” Sierra asked.
    “What else should I think about, being thrown out? I don’t care anymore. Don’t tell me you’re not used to it by now?”
    “Sometimes I expect different. I suppose we’ll have to work up more cash now too. It’s so unfair. Sometimes those people make me so angry.”
    Her words died upon the hollow sound of tapping footsteps. A loan stranger came walking from a turnoff ahead. He staggered to and fro, struggling to button up his brown suede jacket. He muttered to himself with a lowered head. He crossed the road without care for traffic. There walked a man whose long hard day had finally come to an end. A man beaten into self withdrawal, a man half full on liquor to move quickly. The man had a bull’s eye on his head.
    Sierra fixated upon him, a callous little half smile present on her lips. “Poor fool. He has no idea what he looks like.”
    “What’s that?” Alex asked.
    “Fresh meat.”
    “Not again. Please don’t do it, Sierra,” Henry pleaded, settling back upon noting the greedy mark of devotion glazing in her eyes. “At least … don’t hurt him.”
    “Relax Henry, he won’t even notice.”
    Sierra ushered her friends behind a stack of bins. “Hide in here and stay low.”
    They couldn’t help but peak out to watch her bear down like a fearless hunter. She moved slowly for stealth, yet faster than the mark.
    Fluidly, Sierra planted her wrist inside the stranger’s pocket, snatching whatever she felt first. By time he could react she was already too far away.
    Henry stayed out in plain sight unlike the others who bolted behind cover on the first chance. He couldn’t help but