THE WONDERS OF RHAM; SETTLING IN FOR A NEW LIFE

"Shocked." said Janice Pettibon at meeting her grandmere Marsalene Deseveaux in a crowded apartment building in Rham's 10th arrondissment. The woman who taught her how to bake cookies when she was five was now a stripper and a very popular one in one of Rham's many casino lounges. It wasn't as Janice had expected spending eternity relaxing and reminiscing with with the mother of her mother. Deseveaux was living the life she had given up for family, children, and home for every day of her 79 year life. It took Janice Pettibon two days to realize she would not be able to afford to live in the 10th arrondissment. Rents ran as high as h!3 ($US 2000, £ 1024.20) per month. Janice Pettibon needed to get a job so on her fourth day in Hell she went out looking.



She couldn't deal blackjack or the Hellac card game of choice Riposte! that involved three decks and progressive betting that gave her a headache to even attempt to calculate. Typing takes on a new dimension here and office work bored her to tears for the short amount of time she'd done it before getting married and becoming a housewife. There was very little chance of getting married in all the hustle and bustle she found as she drifted down the numbers toward the 17th Rondi. It was just a little too seedy and she settled on a place with a sign in the window that to her read "Help Wanted". Entering she saw all manner of pipes and jars filled with ground spices and oddly shaped leaves. The man at the counter stopped what he was doing, which was reading a foreign paper to say, "One hundred fifty denarii a day and smoke all you want of the stuff on the bottom shelves. You open on Mondays and Tuesdays and have Wednesday and Thursday off. I close the place for three weeks every Ravenshade and if you last until the next one they'll be paid weeks off. Any questions?"


"I'll take it. Do you know where I can find an apartment close by?" Janice asked.


"Yeah there's a place a block up that's h! 1.5 a month with only a 500 d deposit. My brother owns the building."


Janice shook hands with Talshon Akmaniam an Ethiopian smokeshop owner who was happy just knowing that he would have another day off. The last young woman he hired had decided she wanted to get married and move up to the 1st Rondi with the man who said he loved her. He found out later form people in the neighborhood that she was on a shuttle heading out of town used and ashamed to return to her family. That happened alot in Hell and even more so on Rham where the wealthy preyed on the poor in a kind of sick sport. As Janice was about to find out the poor every now and then got a little of their own back.





Kenton Hill, Order of the Quartz Heart (Eng.)
Santayana Chair of Torture History
at the Universijte Di Dis
Chief Historian,
Office of the Torturer General
216 Low Lux Negro 1 AS