Four-thirty in the morning was always a bit chill. Dawn usually was, even inside the Dome, but down in the Old Detroit Basin, it always seemed at least a few degrees cooler.
Not that Death minded it much, the Haitian shouldering a small pack to begin his usual morning trek to The Altar down in the bowl itself, a spot constructed crudely of chunks of concrete with the Loa veves for both Legba and Samedi scratched into the surface of a large flat piece, like a plaque. In giving offerings to both the spirits and to the ghosts that wandered the cemetery, the plateau would be approachable for the day. Which was exactly what he was after, since that was where the apothecary rested.
The lights on the surviving city block of the plateau shone warm and yellow, a beacon in an otherwise drab world. There were no lights directly in the cemetery that surrounded the upraised place of the past, leaving it with the residual lights from far above. He surveyed the land he had been maintaining for little over a decade, inhaling deeply the smell of stale earth and cool air before descending down the curling road into the basin below.
The light was faint and seemed to suck all the color out of everything, just bright enough to read the crude scratchings of names and dates, epitaphs and well-wishes in the here-after across makeshift tombstones made of any stony material people could get their hands on. Rows were barely existent, making it look like crooked teeth in an old giant's open mouth. Somewhere in the depths were the remnants of power lines and cables from generations before of what Detroit used to be, looking like tentacles reaching into the depression. The air moved a bit, displaced by people racing about in the upper levels and circulated with the massive ventilation fans in the upper curve of the Dome far above. It whistled through the old cables, making them vibrate in eerie twangs, a melancholy and impromtu dirge for those thousands buried in the soil that had been an older, free Detroit.
For anyone else, the cemetery would have been a dark and dreary place to spend one's existence. To the whistling Caribbean making his way down from the Cemetery Plateau and into the graves themselves, this was simply a way of life. Someone had to maintain the dead, as a reminder to the living and as a reminder to themselves. And that someone happened to be the Vodou ghost-talker making his way down predetermined paths, beaten flat over time into dirt roads that all converged on the center rise, where the last surviving city block of Old Detroit still stood.
Wisps played among the tombstones, bobbing shadows up and down. Once or twice, he caught the glance of eyes, or felt them looking in his direction. Whenever he actively caught them, a jovial wave was given. Just because they were dead didn't mean they didn't want to be treated like they were. It was a rule to greet placid ghosts, and these were only curious, as they were every morning.
The Altar rose in the dreary gloom, the pedestal approached with a sort of quiet reverence. Even those spirits curious and following the ghost-talker stopped at the base of the rise it sat on, overlooking the back half of the cemetery, that darker portion where the lights from above didn't penetrate.
"Bon maten." he addressed the veves carved on the back piece, stopping in front of the flat table in front of it and dropping the pack he had brought with him. "I 'ope y'two had a lovely sleep."
Another wind rattled the cables deep in the darker portion of the cemetery, causing a far-off clanging sound. He took that as his answer from the two Loa, pulling out a set of wooden bowls, dipping saucers, and cups; two sets each. These, he scattered routinely across the tabletop and set about pouring a half-bowl of spiced cream, dabbling a bit of fresh honey into the saucers, and pouring cups of spiced rum. Next to the set on his left, he set a bundle of dried tobacco leaves for smoking.
"'Ope y'enjoy breakfast, wi?" he added before picking up the shoulder bag and turning to leave. "Mèsi poutèt ou, for watchin' o'er all us in the Basin."
The unseen cables rattled again, brightening his unpainted face with a smile as he strode back down the rise into the cemetery again. It was going to be a good day, he reasoned, catching sight of a cluster of short shadowy ghosts ahead of him on his path back to the plateau.
"Ah, can't b'forgettin' any o'you, can I." he chuckled, setting about on the second task of the morning before the shop opened.
Before he had returned to tend the greenery he sold and paint himself for the day, small clusters of brightly-colored candies and toys, mingled with shot glasses of whiskey, added a sense of life into the otherwise colorless graveyard.
A/N: Reworking things has really helped solidify a bunch of stuff with these five. So I'm reposting the series as need be. There will be long stuff, and not so long stuff. Might include a CanonxOC started by a friend of mine from Tumblr, but that won't be for a while yet. In the meantime, enjoy. disclaimersblahblah
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