Hey Mister, wanna buy a t-shirt?

[07.30.01] » by The Thryll Killer

"Hey mister, Wanna buy a tee shirt?"

"Damn," the boy muttered as he sat on the ground trying to rub some dirt off of the stack of white tee shirts he had looped over his arms. He spent almost all of his spare gil to get the shirts made, and he was for sure not going to let a little dirt make him drop his prices. Only three hundred more and he would be able to move above ground to the plate, where life was easy and fast. Maybe he could get a car and a girlfriend. He would defiantly get a job then, all the people above the plate had jobs, at least until they retired at twenty five. That's what his father had told him when he was younger. He couldn't wait to get started.

So far that day he had only sold three of his novelty tee shirts, and gave one away to a child who looked far worse off than he. But he knew as soon as word got out they would be all the rage.

At least until that tremor shook the plate and drop loads of dust and debris, and other nastiness on this his blessed stack of novelty tee shirts. It wouldn't matter much anyhow, everything in the slums was dark and dirty, the majority of people probably wouldn't notice

Right as he finished rubbing the majority of the filth off of them, the most beautiful girl he had ever seen in his life walked into the dirty square where he worked. Her green eyes pierced his soul from across the square; her pink and red dress unsullied by the dismal lighting and general scum of the slums; her auburn hair, majestically pulled back, with just a few strands loosened to add allure, but not too many and placed just so they didn't appear intentional, or for that matter a mistake.

The boy tried to choke up some words, to call out to her, to say, "Hello", offer her a tee shirt, anything to get this other worldly beauty to speak words to him. He could almost imagine the tinkle of fairy bells melodically tumbling down a waterfall of poetry, she must speak in poetry, mere speech could not come from the lips of this creature.

There was a commotion of footfalls and a spiky haired youth came catapulting into the square and careened right into the fairy creature, knocking her to the ground.

"The flower girl!" Spike said surprised, he then wiped his hands on his pants and offered her a hand up.

It wasn't fair; this brute should not be allowed to touch one such as she.

"You might want to get out of here," Spike hollered at her, "there is a world of hell on its way." He looked nervously back at the ally way sprang from.

Before the boy could say anything she gathered up her flower basket and fled down another ally way.

Spike turned his eyes to the boy, "You! What are you selling?"

"Nah, nah, na, Novelty tee shirts…" he stuttered, starting to unravel one.

Spike boldly strode over to the boy, pushing him back against the wall.

"How much?" Spike's eyes glowed a strange green, a by-product of Mako exposure. Only members of SOLDIER were exposed to Mako energy. Anything that had a member of SOLDIER frightened, the boy wanted nothing to do with.

"Um, five, uh, five gil each…" he struggled to get the words out.

Spike dug around in his pocket and handed the boy a coin, "All I have is a twenty piece, keep the change," and with that he charged down the ally way in pursuit of the flower girl.

"Don't you wanna know what on them?" the boy yelled down the way, before escaping down a different ally way than the SOLDIER.

****

Doesn't matter, Cloud thought as he ran, unfurling the tee shirt with red writing on it. Careful not to knock the gel out of his hair, and not to catch the shirt on his spiked armor plates he pulled it over his head and down over his body, it was a little tight, but the pursuing guards hopefully would be fooled by a boy in a white tee shirt with red lettering on it that said…

"Damn," Cloud muttered as he realized the tee shirt said in bright red, spray painted script, terrorist looking lettering, "Avalanche"