Improvised Folderol, Second Try
Let's see what the random word generator gives us today.
Noun: Stealing
Adjective: Stale
Verb: Fall
And now... The story.
It was just another day for Louis, or at least it felt that way. One day blended into another after he'd lost his home, his job, everything... By the time he'd figured out how to survive without money, a full year had passed. After that he stopped keeping track of time.
They emptied the dumpsters behind Mackenny's Bakery about one hour after dawn, and so he came by while it was still dark. He didn't want to come by too early, or else the patrol cars would catch him; too late, and he'd be fighting off the Street Trash for whatever was in the dumpsters. Not fun. He still had scars.
Didn't look like they were in, thankfully, so he opened the lid on the first one. Nothing edible, so he moved on to the next. Ever since the bums had started raiding the dumpsters, Mackenny had taken to randomizing which one he put the day-old bread in, and so Louis had to try every one of them. If he tried digging through the wrong one... well, he'd seen men die from eating rat poison. He didn't want to go that way.
It was on the fourth dumpster when Louis found what he was looking for. Two boxes of hard rolls, still in their plastics. He grinned and reached for them... and it was at that point that he heard the footsteps.
"Drop 'em."
Great. The Street Trash had arrived.
Clutching the rolls to his chest, Louis took off at a run, the army of vicious, armed bums on his heels. The Street Trash had taken over the allies around Mackenny's a month ago, and he had had to fight for every bit of food in the area since. They outnumbered him seven-to-one today, and he didn't like the odds.
A fire escape caught his eye, and Louis grabbed the rungs, pulling himself up. He struggled to the top, ran up the metal steps, and...
The stone on the edge of the roof crumbled away, and the last he saw was the air rushing around his head.
****
Jericho's friends had mocked him for performing his rituals. There were no "Gods of the Street", they said. No spirits waiting for sacrifices. Just hungry, cold bums, trying to live however they could.
But Jericho had put his faith in the rituals, and now it was rewarded. A corpse laid beside him, holding uneaten, unpoisoned bread. There was food for a week now.
With a smile, Jericho slung the corpse over one shoulder, tucked the bread under the other arm, and set out for his tent.