The human took the long way to work. It was a chilly spring morning and the fast talking man on the radio had promised rain. The human couldn't find her umbrella that morning, but she chanced it anyway. The human had woken up with her bedsheets tangled around her legs and her fat tabby cat sitting on her face. She pushed the cat off. The feline threw her a reproachful look and slunk away. The human rose and discovered, dismally— that she had woken up to a Monday morning.

It wasn't rainy, just—wet. But the promise of rain hung in the air, while the fat clouds overhead grumbled with thunder, as if they were arguing with each other trying to decide whether to rain or not. The human bustled down alleyways. She pulled her hood down over her head. She didn't run, but kept a brisk pace and kept her eyes down.

The long way was more secluded—yes, but it cut through the southern district, skirting around the edges of the city. This was the poorer side of town. The bad part of town. The monster part of town. The barrier had fallen but humanity had been quick to erect a dozen more in its place. Not physical barriers like before. No, these barriers came in the form of 'human only' signs in the windows of stores and restaurants. They came in the form of organized crime, in racial slurs spattered on the subway walls, in the form of paranoia, in the form of an unspoken border slicing down the middle of the city. in the form of separate but equal.

The human crammed her hands into the front pocket of her hoodie. She kept her nose pointed at the sidewalk, keeping as much of her face obscured as possible. She did not stop to admire the yellow flowers in the store windows. She said nothing, when she bumped shoulders with a hairy towering stranger—and picked up her pace when he grunted a soft 'excuse me'. She wasn't supposed to be here. She was alien—a nail that stuck up oddly from the others. She tried to make herself unnoticeable, ignorable wary of a hammer come to pound her back into place. It was an unsettling walk to say the least.

But at the very least it wasn't crowded. Few monsters came out of their houses this close to dawn. A local gang had strong armed their way into establishing an unofficial curfew for all monsters. They didn't want monsters milling around town after dark. But even so, the soft morning light was beginning to slowly draw the denizens of the southern district out of their homes and into the streets. The human felt a cold hand of fear wrap itself around her heart. Bollocks. She needed to hurry. Yet despite her anxiety she kept her same course through the streets.

The human couldn't have handled the subway that morning. She just couldn't. Too many people all crammed together in a sweaty awkward clump—each one practically buzzing muddled emotions. Buzzing with stress, with anxiety, with exhaustion— No, the human had to take the long way to work. Even if she had to walk in the rain through the southern district. It would be worth it.

The human let out a breath of relief when she neared the old meadow mill apartment complex. Once she was past it, she would come to the point where the road forked—the unspoken crossroads between the northern and southern districts. She was almost in the clear. The western fork was just a few yards and a chain link fence shy of the freeway. The human could hear the honking and rumble of the traffic barreling by and felt a twinge of pity for the monsters who had to live so close to the noise. But she didn't dwell on it. She would take the eastern fork of the road—the one that led back into the familiar. Back home.

There was a sudden crash in the alleyway behind the apartment building. The human's heart leapt into her throat and she spun, searching wildly for the source of the noise.

"PLEASE COME OUT LITTLE DOG!" a loud voice sounded through the ambience of clattering garbage cans and lids. "I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS ONLY WISH TO ASSIST YOU." This time the human heard a distinct snarl in the mix—it sounded like a dog. A very agitated dog. The snarl rose into a yelping snap and the loud voice let out a gasp. More crashing. A trashcan lid bounced and rolled out of the alleyway spinning to a stop near the human's feet. She was ready to bolt, feet poised to run, fist's clenched so hard that her nails dug into the palms of her hands. But then…

"P-PLEASE… YOU'RE BROKEN…THE RED STUFF IS SUPPOSED TO STAY INSIDE OF YOU…I-I'M SURE OF IT…" the voice quavered softer than before. The human frowned chewing her lower lip until she tasted blood... The terrifying voice from the alleyway sounded as though it was biting back tears. The human's shoulders fell. Bollocks….

Against her better judgment, swallowing down all the lectures her parents had drilled into her head about stranger danger, all the news reports of monster attacks and gang violence—the human approached.