“Holy!” Grant howled. The words were barely audible. The two of them leaned against the walls opposite one another, trying to catch their breath. “We’re gonna need to warm up!”
“What!” Simon's face twisted with pain as he shouted the word. His breaths seemed labored, uncomfortable. Xavier was nearest to Simon, squatting over his bag, still searching. Simon snapped his fingers at him, but there was no response. “Hey! What did the old man say?”
“We need to warm up.”
Simon motioned for everyone to take cover as he walked toward Xavier and set his pack down. His attention was clearly drawn away from Grant's trivial concern and to the significant amount of unknowns surrounding them. He took to his rifle, shifted it into position, bracing it tightly against his shoulder and activated the light. Slowly down the wall of the overpass, he cleared each section, his trigger finger riding the frame of the firearm as he moved the muzzle from object to object.
Xavier watched as best he could from beside the box truck, speechless, absolutely mesmerized by Simon's precision. Even though he was out of breath and limping, it didn't seem to affect him. His footwork. Light. His attention. Pinpoint. This is what I want to do. Simon slipped in and out of cover. It was clear now that he knew what he was doing. He moved from within Xavier's sight, taking with him any doubt that Xavier may have felt about his abilities and discarded those doubts with the rest of the trash.
Grant crept over to Xavier. “Seems he knows what he's doin'. Still a prick, but at least he won't get us killed.”
Xavier looked on, his eyes filled with eagerness, waiting for Simon to return. Partially ignoring Grant, not on purpose, but simply because the idea of what Simon did was so intriguing, and he didn't want to miss even the smallest detail. Grant spoke again, but Xavier didn't hear it, his mind collecting as much as it could as Simon worked his way back toward them.
Grant's words faded in. “...don't ya get no ideas. You know I still need ya back in the shop. You ain't leavin' me yet, boy.”
“At some point I'm going to have—”
“We’re alone,” Simon said, as he moved toward Xavier. He reached into his pack and pulled a plastic baggie from within. A matchbox inside. He shook it, and the sticks rattled. “This’ll get us started.” He pointed to the vehicles parked along the shoulder, directing Xavier toward them. “Look through some of those cars and try to find some paper.”
Xavier tried the handle to an oversized pickup. Locked. He cupped his hands around his eyes in an attempt to look through the tinted glass. Without lighting it would be impossible to see its contents. Here we go. A portion of the damaged pipes lay in the gutter at his feet. He bent down and gripped it within his palm. One simple strike and the window popped, crumbling to pieces.
“Boy!”
“Sorry!” Probably should've warned them.
With the vehicle now unlocked, he entered, cleared the glass from the seat, and began rooting for scraps of paper. He could hear Grant speaking loudly, but couldn’t make out what was being said. Xavier looked to see the conversation, but the view through the back window was completely blocked. The bed was weighted down with a stack of wooden skids, tools, wheelbarrow, and several car batteries. The owner must’ve had something big planned.
Owner… The first time the word had really struck him as odd. In this world, the more appropriate word may have been possessor. Could you really own anything anymore? Or do you just have it until someone else takes it?
He riffled through the glove box, saving any paper he found. Where’s he want this stuff? Xavier took his stack from the vehicle.
“Where do you—“
“Help me with this!” Simon’s words fought against the noise of the rain.
Grant walked toward him, pointing to his ear. “What?”
“Help me with this.” Simon dropped the tailgate and pulled the wheelbarrow to the edge. He carefully guided it to the ground. “We’ll build a fire in this,” Simon said, as he wheeled it to the double yellow line.
“You want me to put this stack in there?” Xavier asked.
“Not yet. Try and get some more.”
“Alright.” Xavier placed the stack of papers on the floorboard of the pickup and climbed back inside. He felt the bed of the truck lower, followed by a banging of indecision—sporadic movements against the pickup's cab. What are they up to now?
Simon shifted several of the wooden skids into a position to be lowered. “Four of these should be enough.”
Grant obliged him, taking them one by one and leaning all four of them against the wheel well.
“Go ahead and start breaking those down,” Simon said. “I’m going to try and find something to hang our clothes on.”
“Yep, you do that.” Grant took one of the skids and propped it against the wall of the overpass. He started stomping at it, eventually getting his foot caught between the slats.
“Whoa, Whoa, Whoa! Hey! What the hell are you doing? Just grab the sledgehammer. We can't have you slowin' us down if you get hurt.”
“I ain't gonna hurt myself.” Grant wriggled his foot free. “Didn't know there was a sledge. Where's it at?”
Simon took it from the truck and handed it to him while shaking his head. “Be careful with it.”
“I got this,” he responded sharply, snatching the sledgehammer from Simon's grip. Grant heaved each strike into the skids, splintering the wood into workable kindling. The sharp cracks of metal splitting wood continued, and Simon began rummaging through the junk that had been dumped there long ago. Old tires, metal rods, trash cans, all things in his way were being lifted and thrown about.
The clanging of metal caught Xavier's attention. He looked across the truck's cab and through the driver's side window. No tint? The window was down. Guess I didn’t need to break this one. Oh, well. It appeared that Simon was clearing a path through the clutter. There seemed to be a method to it, although at that moment he couldn't tell for what. Xavier’s view was blocked by Simon's tall wiry figure.
Simon took an awkward stance and then, from his side, came a large metal barrel tilted on its bottom. He rolled it along its edge toward the wheelbarrow. It was slowly let down, wobbled for a moment, and then settled.
“This’ll work better for the fire.” He lifted the handles to the wheelbarrow and moved it to Grant. “Use this to set the kindling in.”
Grant scooped a good portion of the wood within his arms and dumped it into the wheelbarrow. “Decent amount.”
“We’ll need more.” Simon stared Grant down and then looked toward the truck. “Hey kid, how's it coming?”
Xavier backed out of the passenger side of the pickup. “Not too bad. I'll check that black car next.” He tilted the bench seat forward and poked through the empty beer cans and snack wrappers. A small pile of trash spilled over the top of the seat as he dug deeper into the mess. The light crunching and rustling paused for a moment. Something was out of place. His fingers gripped a much thicker metal. He lifted it up through the clutter. His eyes grew wide—the power...
“Here Xavier, straighten it up. Up a little more.”
“It's heavy. My arms are getting tired.”
“Just up a bit more. Hang in there this is the last one.”
“How many more screws? Please hurry.”
“This is good for you.”
“This is too many.”
“There we go. You okay?”
“Yes. Those are just really heavy, and we did so many of them.”
“Hopefully this works out with the whole house boarded up. If it doesn't… we'll have to figure something else out. Not quite sure what, but we may just have to live in the woods or something.”
“I’m not doing that. How will Mom know where to find us?”
“We’ll leave her a note or something. This whole thing’s going to pass. It's already dying out, and the gangs haven't come through in awhile. That's a good sign we might not have to leave.”
“We should have Matt and his m
om stay with us.”
“Yeah, we’ll ask again. We just need to do something else first. Come with me.”
“What?”
“I wanted to wait until you were older, but— Xavier?
“Yeah?”
“You’re not a kid anymore.”
“Huh?”
“You can’t be one anymore. That world’s over. You’re going to need this.”
“Really? I can have it?”
“You have to learn to defend yourself. Just in case I hav—”
“To leave like Mom?”
“In case something happens. I'm not leaving. She's still out there, she’ll be back eventually.”
“Let me hold it.”
“Not yet, you need to know the rules.”
A gun—a small, .25 caliber Raven pistol sat in the fifteen-year-old's hand. Xavier whispered through his dad's instructions, “Keep your finger off the trigger and along the frame ... Don't point it at anything you aren't ready to shoot ... Eject the magazine ... Lock the slide ... Make it safe.” He counted down the side of the magazine, “One, two, three, four. And, where'd that other one go?” He carefully sorted through the trash on the seat. The expelled round rolled into the stitching of the cushion. Xavier pinched it and pushed it into the follower. The magazine returned to the grip and the slide went back then rocketed forward.
It would be his secret. Grant would surely take it from him if he knew. Simon would argue he couldn’t trust him with it. There’s no way I can tell them. He checked the eyes of his companions. No one was looking. The gun went muzzle first into his pants pocket. The pile of scrap paper was gathered up, and Xavier moved on to the black sedan.
This already looked far more promising than the scraps that Xavier had folded into his back pocket. An assortment of books was piled up in the rear window area behind the backseat. Jackpot! The rear passenger window sat halfway down, and he peeked inside. Immediately, his head jerked back. A strong odor of ammonia made him reconsider whether or not it was worth it. “What in the world is that?” The smell may as well have knocked him over as he shuffled his feet away from the car.
He stood there staring at the car, shaking his head, he could still smell it. A strong huff of air from his lungs. This better be worth it. Xavier pulled his shirt over his nose, reached in, and popped the lock. The door was tight. He tugged hard at the handle, and the door shot open. And, there it is. A urine-soaked blanket lay on the floor behind the driver's seat. The dark stains had set. Small black hairs were spread all over it. Definitely a cat living in here.
He continued holding his nose and as swiftly as he could, took his arm and pushed it across the back, bulldozing the books onto the pavement. He stacked them just neatly enough to carry them to the burn barrel.
“Take these.” Simon set the box of matches on the books as Xavier walked past. “You know how to get this going?”
“Yeah, I'm pretty sure I can handle it.” Xavier said, stopping just short of the barrel. He began to peruse the collection, sliding each one from the stack and onto the ground. “Never heard of these,” he said to himself, “1984, Lord of the Flies.” Each title a different sounding thud against the street. “Brave New World, Fahrenhei—.”
“These are the Classics, boy!” Grant interrupted, picking a few of them from the pile that lay at Xavier's feet. “Couldn't have picked somethin’ else?”
“I don't know the difference.” Xavier shrugged. “I'm just trying to get the fire started.”
“Let's hold off on these ones here.” He took a few more from Xavier's hands. “What else they got back there?”
“This is mostly it. Maybe a few more over there on the ground, but pretty much the same sort of stuff.”
“Well, here's the wood. Let's not burn these yet. We'll see if we can make do.”
The two of them started picking the larger pieces of wood from the wheelbarrow, setting them off to the side. Xavier pulled the scrap pieces of paper from his pocket, balled them up, and tossed each one into the metal drum.
“Need to get some air in there,” Grant said.
“Why?”
“Fire's gotta breathe.” Grant clasped the rim of the barrel. “These walls are pretty thin. Maybe I ca—”
“I got this.” Simon reached into his pack and dug through it. He lifted a shiny, steel carpenter's hammer and twirled it in his hand. He looked at Grant. “I’ll show you how it’s done.”
The overpass echoed with a sharp ringing as the claw punctured the metal. Simon's arm flailed about, lacking precision, but it didn't matter—holes are holes. His face turned red, and he switched hands to start again, fresh. He worked his way around, grunting while he did. The bottom of the barrel became a ruffled skirt—shredded metal bending every which way. “Let's get this fire started,” Simon said between strained breaths, leaning over onto his knees, his butt resting on the truck's bumper.
Simon watched as Grant meticulously placed the larger fragments of the broken skids inside, forming a cone within the burn barrel. “Let's do it,” Grant said, taking the copyright page from 1984 along with a few pages from its foreword and rolled them into a makeshift torch. He patted Xavier on the back. “Light it up.”
Xavier struck a match and lit the end, forcing Grant to work it through the slits in the bottom of the barrel. Eventually, the fire took, and the wood began to crackle.
Outside, the roar of the storm was dying. The intensity of the wind settled along with it, but it still managed to chill the three as they huddled around the fire. Their shoes encircled the base of the barrel, and three pairs of socks hung from the rim. The wheelbarrow pulled closely to the fire held the weight of Simon's rifle against it and several pieces of clothing from its rear frame.
“Keep feeding it. If we need to break down more skids, we will,” Simon said.
Or you'll just make us do it. Xavier threw in a few more scraps of wood. Swirls of hot air and smoke carried flickering sparks from within the metal drum. It was beautiful. The smell of wood burning. The heat against his palms. No wall preventing him from the real world. A spontaneous campsite. All I need is an excuse to make this my way of life.
Simon casually worked the blade of a pocketknife over his fingernails. It never seemed as though he could stop fidgeting. Xavier watched him, wondering who Simon was—what he was thinking. How much of what he said was true? And how much was the act?
Some of it was certainly an act. He seemed to try too hard to convince them that he was in charge—that he was running the show. Xavier and Grant didn't question that. He was in charge. Haverty had made that clear. What makes him tick? Simon's eyes seemed lost within the task of trimming his fingernails.
“How long have you been with the S.A.?” Xavier’s words momentarily broke Simon’s gaze.
“Four months. I don't know.” Back to task. His left index finger must have been tricky. He had been digging at the nail for quite some time now.
“And before that?”
“On my own.”
The look of disbelief on Xavier’s face went unseen by Simon. On my own? A simple response, but the words sank deep into Xavier’s conscience. Surviving this world alone? It couldn't be. There wasn't any way that someone could do it. One person for shelter, water, and food. That would be impossible. “How?”
Simon folded his knife and put it away. “What do you mean? You just do it. Otherwise, you die.”
“It takes a whole town for us to survive. By yourself... that just seems impossible.”
“Of course you think that way, you've been sheltered this whole time. To rely on yourself, well especially you, now that would be impossible.”
Xavier hesitated. He knew that was true, but it wasn't his fault. He had simply done what his father told him to. No real chance to explore on his own thus far. He was still learning and would continue to do so. So what if he hadn't been cast into the fire? He was still much further along than many. His skillset was important—a true learned trade. Simon knew how to point a
gun. Anyone could do that. “You're not so unique.”
“Compared to all the people you know, I am.”
Grant butted in, “You're like us, city dweller. You ain’t no lone wolf. You gave it up.”
“That wasn't the plan,” Simon snapped back. “I enjoyed being alone. Something you two could never do.”
“And, what? What changed for ya?” Grant said it from a pedestal, trying to rub in that Simon couldn’t handle it. Just a slight insinuation—an attempt to make Simon feel foolish.
“They took me...” Simon's words faded with any expression on his face.
“Huh?” Xavier didn’t expect an answer. Simon, for the most part, had kept to himself—all business. When he said those words—‘They took me'—Simon seemed to be begging for an outlet. His proud demeanor had fallen, along with his guard, and at first, there was nothing from Simon, only silence as his stoic face faded in and out of the light. Is he okay? “Simon?”
“They took me... I didn't have a choice.”
Grant turned toward Xavier, his eyes clearly asking what he had done.
“A choice in what?” Xavier asked.
“The S.A... They took me for trials. It was that or death. They don't like loners out there doing for themselves. They don’t let you know this, but they wanna eliminate that. They want everyone to be S.A.”
Xavier nodded, believing every word. I know it.
“They test your loyalty. They made me kill. I—I didn't want to.” He rubbed vigorously at his forehead trying to erase the memory. Simon shuddered and began pacing. “The first was horrible,” he continued, “simply horrible, an innocent... a woman minding some goats. She was smiling.” His eyes welled. It seemed the words had come from behind him. His lips barely moved. He was someplace else far removed from the overpass. “My sights on her, and theirs on me.”
“Lynn...” Grant's head fell to the side. His painful countenance. There was no question about it. He whispered again, “Lynn.” Grant's jaw tensed. His teeth pushed against one another, causing his jaw to flare. “Murderer!” Grant shoved Simon hard to the ground. “I'm tired of buryin’ my friends! My wife!” He rushed to Simon, but he just lay there on the ground where he was thrown. He didn't even look up.
Almawt Virus Series (Book 2): Days Since...Xavier [Day 853] Page 9