A Crack House

Di led the way, strolling down the street confidently. Lois Lane followed, self-conscious about how she must look in this company. Mara de la Cruz shadowed her close behind, and sometimes Lois thought she could feel the woman breathing down her neck, hands drawing too close to the reporter's ass, which made Lois quicken her step.

It was two blocks before Lois realized they were headed for Suicide Slum.

Lois told herself it was the danger of going into Metropolis' most notorious quarter that had her heart pounding, every sense alive, body almost shaking with energy...but Lois knew it might as easily be the aftereffects of the ****. She had actually smoked crack, and she could still taste the chemical flavor in her mouth, oddly metallic. Her nostrils felt burned, her lungs and stomach jittery.

Their motley group turned toward a brownstone that had seen better decades; one of those apartment blocks that had been put up quickly following World War II, and then never torn down, no matter how badly it needed it. Cracks were visible in the brick facade, and the faces on the gargoyles had been broken off. The lightbulbs on the streetlamps had been broken, and homeless forms huddled near the building, in cardboard boxes and under piles of newsprint, clutching shopping carts full of miscellaneous stuff.

The blonde led them unerringly down a stair to a sub-street apartment, knocked twice, and then walked in.

The human smell hit Lois so strongly she almost retched. She'd smelled that before, in places where unwashed bodies had huddled together too long...it was the smell of poverty, and beneath it a sickly scent of ****. Every square foot of floorspace was occupied by bodies, so that they had to step over them carefully, working their way toward a back room, where a bare bulb cast the only light. Here and there, lighters flared, and Lois heard the hiss and gurgle of crack pipes, saw emaciated faces sucking on the glass pipestems...and Lois realized other things were happening too.

Bodies humping in the dark, pressed together in sweaty congress, some of them with manic energy, others limp and almost lifeless. Lois saw one young woman with dark, stringy hair, teeth starting to rot from the crack pipe, being humped fiercely by a big black man...and realized with a shock she recognized the woman. Tonya Wong. So far gone, Lois couldn't tell if she was being **** or not...

Mara caught her arm and pushed.

"Keep moving," the Latina whore hissed. "Jenny's in the next room. You wanted to see her, right?"

Lois kept moving. Mentally, she tried to prepare herself for what she might find.