Deadman

It was a good haul. Each of our attackers had a handful of ammunition, and most still had intact weapons. I took the ones I thought would be the most valuable and left the rest to the dust. Overloading myself could hurt me in the long run. Never knew when an extra ounce would get you killed. One thing I noticed as I searched the corpses was that each of the men had the same tattoo. A blue head with horns and a smile. They also all showed signs of heavy radiation exposure. All of them were on the edge of it being a fatal dose. Once I was done picking over the corpses I headed back into the shelter.

Mercy was tinkering with a pile of gunpowder and metal, a manic smile on her face. I took a small pouch I’d filled with ammo I couldn’t use and likely wouldn’t sell well. She nodded up at me and cracked one of the shells open with her tools, moving the powder around with a practiced ease.

Leah was sitting in a corner with her eyes closed. Awake, I think, but unmoving. Graves was by the door with a set of incredibly small screwdrivers that he was using to tinker with his hammer.

I approached Leah first. Her eyes opened as I did so, and she put on her smile. I found her constant smile about as off-putting as most people likely found mine.

“The people that attacked us. They all had the same tattoo. Blue head with horns. All had a heavy dose of rads on them too.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Blue devils. Not surprising. That’s the group of mercs my intel says that V is working with. You said they had radiation poisoning though?”

“Yeah. Just enough to hurt em bad, but not kill them.”

She ran a hand absently along her scar. “V must have known we were on the way. This is my fault. We weren’t subtle in Medina. He must’ve had some people there.” She nodded at me. “Thanks”

“More info means less a chance of dying. No need to thank me.” With that I walked across the room, stopping briefly in front of Graves. I gave him a nod, he gave me one, I gave him another, and he returned that one as well.

“Glad we understand each other,” he muttered with his staticky voice..

With that I found a corner of my own and started working on cleaning my guns. The shotgun didn’t need much maintenance, that was part of the beauty of shotguns, but I took the time to clean the dust from the storm out of it anyway. Then I sharpened my sword, and double checked that all my weapons and magazines were loaded.

With nothing else to do, and frustrated that I was being held in place by my current allies inability to survive heavy radiation doses, I decided to read. I brought several books, but immediately grabbed my well-worn copy of ‘Gavain and The Hollow Knight’, it was my favorite, and the third in the series.

Just as I got into the flow of reading, Mercy took a break from what she was doing and walked over to me. “What’s that?”

I looked up at her. “A book. I assume The Republic has them?”

She nodded, unperturbed by my attempt at getting her to leave me alone. “Yes, we have bibles, copies of the constitution, and the Book of the Prophet. I’ve never seen one like that before though.”

I frowned. “Do you leave the republic often? As a Marshall?”

She nodded. “Yes, but only to go after specific targets.” She cocked her head a little. “What’s that one about?” she pointed.

“It’s about a lizard man named Gavain and his adventures. In this one he encounters a living suit of armor and helps him on a quest to discover his origins.”

“A living suit of armor? That’s silly.”

I held my tongue at the obvious retort regarding the fact that she only had access to the bible, the laws of long dead men, and a prophet whose mention made my teeth itch.

Leah spoke up. “A living suit of armor isn’t silly. I’m pretty sure that’s what Graves is.”

Graves looked up from his hammer, and gave a nod, game for the joke.

Mercy smiled. “That would definitely make more sense than him being human.”

I ignored them and tried to get back into reading. I wasn't opposed to general chatting with them, particularly if I thought I might learn something interesting, but I wasn’t trying to make friends. I didn’t really do friends. Unless I was forced, as was the case with Deux or, sometimes, Nico.

Just as I started getting back into the story, reading about a fight Gavain and the Hollow Knight were having with a horde of minotaurs, Mercy spoke up again. “Do you have any others?”

“Other what?”

“Books? This storm could take awhile, and I’ve already done all the prep I feel comfortable in a structure this unstable.

I opened my pack, and took out the stack of six paperbacks I kept at the bottom and put them in front of her. “Careful with em, they’ve been through a nuclear war, not sure how much more they can take.”

She nodded and looked along the spines, eventually picking ‘The Traitor of Jakkar’. I hadn’t gotten to that one yet myself, but from the back I knew it was all about a man who, in spite of his great age, betrayed the much younger ruler of a country to take control and turn the nation into what he believed it should be.

Leah stood from her corner to take a book from the stack as well. She took a spy thriller, ‘The Red and the Dead’, and took it to the corner. It wasn't usually my kind of thing, but it was hard to be picky in a wasteland.

Graves surprised me by approaching as well. He thumbed through each of the remaining books before landing on one called, ‘The Duke’s Hammer’. It had a mostly shirtless man clutching a woman in a tight fitting dress while the sea crashed behind them. I had only bought that one off of Bill because he offered me a great discount and bundled it with a couple others. It wasn't the kind of thing I expected Graves to pick, but considering he read the back before choosing it I guessed he knew what he was getting into. It reminded me of something important. The people around me had depths I didn’t know. It wouldn’t be wise to make assumptions, these weren’t the wasters I was used to dealing with.

Once everyone was settled with their books, we all just read, slept, or ate until the storm passed. I made a couple extra passes on the bodies, to see if I missed anything valuable and keep myself from going stir crazy. I’d never been good at standing still, and it was particularly hard when the barriers to me leaving were arbitrary. The second pass I didn’t turn up anything new, but on the third I found a full lighter and a canteen of hooch. I sat in the middle of the storm, and polished it off myself. It was just enough to catch a slight buzz off of if I drank as much as I could each sip. After that I pulled out the last of the ursan meat I had and ate it.

The Khan had probably sent more forces to the Black Woods by now. With their vehicles it shouldn’t take much time at all. He’d definitely collected the first tribute, but what he did beyond that was a mystery to me. Atlan was in charge of that territory for now, and if Leroy was smart he may be able to turn it all into a boon for his people. I’d have to ask around next time I could. I’d also need to warn the undertakers that it wasn’t worth sending an expedition down that way. No reason to lose people to ursans without the chance to bring any of the freshly dead home.

I finished my meal and headed inside. The storm was finally starting to clear, and that meant we’d be able to start our mission in earnest soon. Leah, and Graves had finished their respective books and placed them back on the pile, moving back to maintaining their equipment. Mercy on the other hand was now on her third book, moving through my Gavain book as well as ‘The Duke’s Hammer’, in quick succession.

“Storms about done. We should head out soon,” I said.

Leah opened her eyes again. “Agreed. V will know the attack failed. We want to be out of here before he sends someone or something else out this way. We were lucky this group didn’t have any of his more advanced tech.”

With that we all started packing up. Mercy went to hand the book back to me, she was about halfway through.

I shook my head. “You can hold onto it. Not sure I was going to get to that one anytime soon.”

She smiled, and I felt my own lip twitch to match the expression, but it didn’t quite get there. Instead I just gave her a curt nod. After that I took a peek ahead of the rest of the group to make certain that the storm had passed. I saw a clear blue sky and orange ground as far as I could see. I gave the all clear, and we all walked out and started back toward our objective.