Part XVII - Cartons on the Curb
The air was still cold with the remnants of the predawn dark. Marcus sat in the idling truck, the engine a low, nervous rumble that mirrored the tension in his own chest. On the passenger seat, the entire $8,500 stake—the money Maria had withdrawn—sat in crisp, bundled stacks of twenties and fifties. It smelled faintly of paper and the bank vault, a tangible, frightening weight that was the physical realization of their risk.
He just sat, tracing the route to the commercial press on the industrial map taped to the dashboard. Finally, he pulled the truck into gear, the capital riding on the outcome.
He drove the finished plates to the commercial press. He took one last look at the wager, then closed the car door, sealing the gamble inside the vehicle. He stepped into the noise and heat of the industrial park. At the press house, the air was thick with the rhythmic, mechanical drumming of the massive lithographic machines. The smell of oil, heat, and solvent dominated the warehouse. Marcus watched the final assembly with the tense, detached focus of a man who knew a single lever error could wipe out his entire existence.
When the run finished, it was no longer just paper and ink—it was a solid pallet, wrapped tautly in industrial plastic, five hundred copies strong. Each book was printed on smooth, heavy, glossy stock with heavy, vibrant inks, a quality standard utterly foreign to the independent comic scene of the time. The sheer, overwhelming quantity of the books, stacked six feet high, was a final, undeniable testament to the size of their risk.
Bloomers and the Monkey King entered the market not with a bang, but with a deliberate, quiet pressure. Its premium, dense construction was a physical challenge to the cheap standards of the industry, creating an unavoidable contrast. Marcus pulled the first heavy carton from the loading dock and secured it in his truck. He drove toward downtown, initiating the slow invasion.
After a handful of indifferent stops where he was swiftly dismissed by gatekeepers unwilling to risk the new, Marcus pulled up to his primary target: The Collector's Vault, downtown's biggest specialty shop.
Marcus killed the engine and stepped onto the curb of the grimy side street off 42nd. The street was quiet, smelling of exhaust and stale food. The Collector's Vault itself was tucked away, its only signage a chipped plastic board barely visible behind a metal grate.
He pushed through the front door. The shop was a long, narrow space where yellowed fluorescence struggled to cut through the dust-motes. The air was heavy, a cloying mix of old newsprint, paper rot, and stale tobacco—the pervasive smell of a stagnant industry. For Marcus, the moment he stepped inside, the shop became a fortress of mediocrity, a place defined by its refusal to change. He saw the endless rows of sagging, disorganized long boxes as a bottleneck he had to smash through with pure, undeniable value.
Marcus set the heavy carton on the floor next to the counter, and without a word, pulled out a single copy of Bloomers and the Monkey King. He slid the glossy comic across the counter, where it landed silently next to Gary's pile of dull, newsprint pamphlets. The vibrancy of the cover—the bright orange uniform and the dense, clean black lines—was a defiant splash of color in the shop's yellowed gloom.
The owner, Gary, remained hunched low behind a counter cluttered with faded price guns and loose change, slowly tilting his head down to observe the unsolicited intrusion. He narrowed his eyes, not with curiosity, but with the immediate suspicion of an old gatekeeper examining an infection. He looked at the comic's sheen as though it were personally insulting the dust and comfort of his stagnant industry.
"What is this, Marcus? You know I don't stock bootlegs anymore," Gary grumbled.
Marcus let the accusation hang, then placed two copies onto the counter. The heavy, glossy paper settled with a dense, decisive weight. Marcus didn't challenge the comment; he just tapped the thick cover. "We're not selling a lottery ticket, Gary," Marcus insisted. "We're selling material validation. Look at it next to a Marvel title. Their newsprint feels disposable; this feels permanent. That's the contrast.
"We used heavy, premium stock and full-color press. This paper alone costs double what a major publisher pays for newsprint. We can't sell this for fifty cents, Gary. We're asking for one dollar right now to establish the quality. The three-dollar price is the goal, but only after you prove the demand at this price. This book doesn't compete with the majors; it frames them as cheap. Prove the demand at this price, and we scale the volume. We establish the new standard first."
Gary let out a long, slow breath, a sign that the pitch had landed not on his emotions, but on his ledger. He picked one up, his skepticism warring with a compelled respect for the tactile difference. He thumbed the thick cover. "The quality is extravagant, I'll give that to you. It feels more like manga than a weekly comic. But my customers are creatures of habit, Marcus. They're here for nostalgia, not innovation."
Marcus leaned in. "Nostalgia is just fatigue, Gary. Your customers are tired of seeing the same four colors on the same thin paper. They are hungry for a jolt of new energy. This book offers a completely new world, a clean start. It's the alternative they are actively searching for, something that proves this industry still has forward momentum. Stack it right here," he insisted, pointing to the end of the main rack.
Gary rubbed his thumb against the spine of the comic, still calculating the risk. "And what if I put it there and it just sits? That's prime real estate. I could spend that risk on guaranteed Batman back issues."
Marcus looked him straight in the eye. "You have a thousand Batman back issues. Give me twenty copies right here. That's a minimum, calculated risk that solves your bigger problem: bored customers. You just need to hand them one copy, and the quality will win."
Gary scratched his chin, his eyes darting between the glossy comic and the register. He let out a deep, grudging sigh, "Fine. Twenty copies, paid for now. That is all."
Marcus smiled, a quick, tight pull of the lips. He collected the meager cash from the initial sale and hauled the remaining bulk of his carton back to the truck.
He was out the door and back on the street in less than thirty seconds. Gary was the only one who even bit. The success was twenty books; the failure was the rest of the five thousand.
Marcus walked across the street to the rattling metal payphone mounted to the wall of a laundromat. He dropped a dime. Instead of calling home, he dialed Big City Comics, the major distributor he hadn't dared visit yet—a massive, final long shot for an order that could still save the day.
A crisp, professional voice answered. "Big City, how can I help you?"
"It's Marcus. I'm calling about a new title, Bloomers and the Monkey King—"
"Hold on, let me check the log," the voice interrupted. A pause stretched, filled only with the hum of the dial tone. "Ah, yes. We got three other calls about that today. Look, we only move guaranteed inventory. Three dollars is too far outside the established price point. We can't justify the shelf risk. Good luck." Click.
The receiver clicked into the cradle. Marcus stood a moment, his forehead pressed against the cold metal casing of the phone box. That was the last of the big accounts. That's almost all the shops, he realized.
In a final, desperate act, he walked half a block to The Corner Exchange, a tiny, unmarked hobby shop he hadn't even bothered listing. The owner, an old woman behind a counter piled high with dusty sports cards, looked up at him with tired eyes. Marcus didn't bother with the speech. He just placed a single copy of Bloomers and the Monkey King on the counter.
She didn't touch it. She didn't look at the cover art.
"If I take this," she said, voice flat, "it sits until I die. I don't buy risk, young man. I sell nostalgia."
Marcus nodded, collected the comic, and walked out. The heavy carton of unsold inventory in the truck felt like a coffin he was dragging back home. The entirety of his gamble, he knew, now rested on the small, brightly colored column of twenty books sitting on Gary's dusty rack.