Born of Silicon

Book 5 Chapter 45

Those days flew by. Before I knew it, the storm was ending and the three of us were in the garage. The looks we got were something. They saw us as just Vince dragging along a diver who can’t use half his body and a thirteen year old kid. A few of them tried to pull Vince to the side and ask him what was going on, what the hell was he thinking.

The car we got put up in wasn’t Silver’s old car. No, that was only ever brought out for extremely dangerous missions, or at least was before it didn’t come back. Our car was standard, but freshly refurbished.

Silver came out and did their usual speech. ‘Make sure you come back, you won’t die for nothing’ and all that. We set off west, my first time leaving the city since we arrived.

For our first ever mission, we got sent to the junkyard. It’s safe, at least normally. 

I was fucking anxious the second we got out of the dome, and both of them could see it. Vince knew exactly why, but I never told Drew much about when I used to be dragged around by Silver.

“Need a book?” Vince asked.

“No.” I needed to keep an eye out. Missions I saw before almost always ended in a fight. I really thought this would be the same. We’d go somewhere, grab some scrap, kill some people, and leave.

“How about working the radio?” Vince suggested. “If anyone tries to threaten us, you’ll be the first to know.”

I gladly took it. Drew had thankfully trained me with it during our days practicing. I knew what I was doing, at least kind of. Keeping track of everything was tough at first.

Working the radio didn’t do much to calm me down, but it did give me something to focus on. Drew plugged himself in and drove, while Vince watched the desert. Drew was calm, collected, confident enough to do some unimportant tasks.

“Mind if I customize the car a bit?” He asked.

“How?” Vince asked.

“Draw a little something on the dash. I’m the most likely to die out here, figured you should have something to remember me by.”

“Don’t say that!” I yelled.

“Hey, I’m not going to. I’m just saying it’s possible.” He shrugged. “People die out here. Ignoring that fact doesn’t make it go away. I’m comfortable with the reality that I’m not going to see myself die of old age, and if a bullet doesn’t do it my brain will. And it’s not just for you, I want something to remind me what I’m fighting for.”

“I don’t mind.” Vince said.

Drew carried a small collection of paints and brushes in his pack. He pulled them out and got to work, not even needing to look at the desert to drive. His face lit up in a way that it never did for anything else whenever he painted. Over the course of an hour his creation slowly came to life, a human brain with thorny wires wrapped tightly around it.

“You two want to add anything?” He asked.

“I haven’t drawn anything since before the world ended.” Vince admitted. “Maybe I should practice first.”

“Got anything in mind?”

“I had a dog.” Vince said simply.

“That works. And you Cassie?”

“I don’t know.”

“That’s alright.” Drew reassured me. “Just whenever you think of something that means something to you, let me know.”

I knew right away what I wanted it to be. It just took a while for me to find the courage to say it.

“A mouse.” I barely squeaked out the words. “My parents used to call me…”

“That’s good. We’ll get you some practice too sometime.” He moved on, thankfully not lingering on my breaking voice.

The conversation died until we made it to the junkyard. Vince had some friends who told him about a little building, hidden in a quiet part of the junkyard. Drew knew the route already and took us right in.

It took me a long time to be even kind of comfortable in that place. Not because of the people there and potential amubushes, no, I was too inexperienced to know what to look out for. I was convinced every scrapheap was going to collapse and bury us. Although that wasn’t entirely my fault. I could hear scrappers doing their job in the distance, metal scraping on metal, but the way sound works in that place is fucked. It bounces through the pathways, distorting it and making it impossible to tell what direction anything is coming from. The sound can even bounce for close to a mile if you’re in the right spot. So all I heard was metal shifting with no source.

The drive to our little abandoned house was quiet, if you ignore the shifting metal, the sand and scrap beneath our tires, and an occasional distant gunshot. There was a group who got there before us, another group from Silver’s. We joined them.

The drive in was quiet, work was quiet, and the way out was quiet. Just a perfectly normal scrapping run. And you know what?

It was exactly what I needed. 

When we got home, I felt great. I was calmer than I’d been in months. I didn’t need to get lost in a book. I didn’t need to hide with Drew. I didn’t need to run to the range. I was finally doing something. I was finally earning my keep, paying back Silver for part of what they spent on me over the last year. I wouldn't be a burden anymore.

We celebrated coming back, and as soon as the storm ended, we went back out. Back to the junkyard.

It was a few trips before anything ever happened. We were at the concrete house when a scout started poking around. Drew was always on alert, he had cameras in the back of his head.

“Heads up.” He whispered and tilted his head. “Scout just passed by.”

“I saw.” Vince nodded.

“Me too.” Yeah that was a lie. I couldn’t pick out footsteps in the junkyard yet. Of course both of them saw straight through me. 

“He was armed, but no armor.” Vince said to both of us, but really just for my benefit. “You two take cover, and I’ll go scout.”

“I’m not just going to fucking sit here.” I argued, my knife and pistol already in my hands.

Vince glanced between me and Drew, and Drew nodded.

“I’ll be fine.” Drew promised.

“Alright, come on.” Vince pulled off the bandana around his neck, grabbed a second from his satchel, and tucked them into the back of his shoes. They’d drag behind him as he walked and cover his tracks. He tossed me two as well, and I clipped them onto the back of my ankles. “Time for you to learn how to scout. Drew, we’ll be right back.”

My blood started pumping at that.

Vince started walking towards where I assume the scout was, and I followed close behind. He stopped at the entrance to a pathway and crouched down.

Footsteps. He signaled and pointed at the ground. I nodded, and we continued on.

I was on edge the entire time, jumping at every distant sound. I thought I was ready for this kind of thing, but no, I seriously considered just running back to Drew and getting my rifle out of the car. But I’m nothing if not a dumbass, and kept right on Vince’s heels.

We followed the footsteps to a group of four people. They were scrawny, barely surviving out here. I could hear them talking, they were desperate, debating if they should attack us or not. 

Go. I signaled, only for Vince to throw out his arm.

Wait. He insisted. I couldn’t understand why. He could hear them making their decision. They were almost certainly going to attack us. We had the drop on them.

Vince just creeped back and headed back to Drew.

“Why aren’t we attacking?” I whispered when we were a good distance away.

“It’s a bad idea to put a plan in motion without informing everyone in your group. If we get into trouble, Drew won’t be able to help if he doesn’t know the plan. We fall back, prepare with him, and go from there. We let them walk into an ambush and put them down.”

“But they don’t even know we’re here! It’d be easy!”

“It would.” He agreed. “But they can still decide against attacking. I’m not going to kill them for what they might do.”

“I’ve seen you kill for less.” Fuck I regretted saying that the second it was out of my mouth.

Vince didn’t say a single word on the walk back to our car. I didn’t try to say anything either.

It was less than two minutes to walk back to Drew, but every step dragged on. It felt endless.

Drew was in cover behind the low concrete wall of the house, already having put on our single set of heavy armor. Vince and I always had helmets and vests, but that’s it. It only took a moment to fill him in.

“Here’s what I’m thinking.” Vince said. “You stay here. Cassie and I will hide around the corner. The second they step in, you open fire and we step out behind them.”

“We’re not going to try to talk to them?” Drew asked.

Vince paused, the thought hadn’t even crossed his mind.

“It takes a long time for old habits to die.” Vince adds.

“Right.” Vince nods. “You take the lead then. We’ll be ready in cover when things go south.”

“Sounds good.”

Vince and I did what we planned. By the entrance we found a small alcove to hide out in. Neither of us said a word while we waited there awkwardly. We were only saved when my ears picked out a sound.

Footsteps. I signaled. 

Ok. Vince responded.

A few seconds later, the four of them showed up, weapons already drawn. Drew yelled out. I don’t remember exactly what he said, but things went south fast. Vince touched my shoulder just a moment before it came to blows.

I stepped out of cover and raised my pistol. I looked down the sights, directly into the back of the raider. My finger was on the trigger, but I couldn’t make it move.

I froze.

Blood bloomed from the guys back as Vince fired over my shoulder. A moment later, all four of them laid on the ground from both Vince and Drew. I just stared at them.

My vision went black as Vince put his hat over my head. That broke me out of whatever trance I was in at least.

“Come on.” Vince’s voice was muffled, distant. He put his hand on my back and guided me back to the car.

I got helped into the back seat, and a breakfast bar and some water put into my hands. I just sat there, staring straight ahead.

Vince’s voice reached my ears, and I looked to the side to find him sitting beside me.

“I was your age when I first took a life.” He said. “It doesn’t get easier, and that’s a good thing. What you're feeling now? Hold on to it, it’s what makes you human. What we did wasn't good, it isn’t worth celebrating. But it was us or them, and surviving is all that matters. You do get used to it though, as bad as that sounds. You learn to live with it.”

I didn’t respond.

“I’m going to get back to work. You just relax, alright?”

Vince left, and Drew took his place. He didn’t say anything, just kept me company. Kept me from doing anything fucking stupid.

I barely moved from that seat until we got home. As soon as we did, I ran straight to Silver. I cried to them, and they understood. They knew just what to say, like always.

Look, I’m sure you don’t want to hear about me being miserable for a few hours, and I don’t want to sit here and recount every circular conversation until lessons got pounded through my thick skull. To make a long story short, Silver was friends with a therapist. I started seeing them daily at first.

Therapy was… complicated, to say the least. But it helped eventually. After a few months, I started heading out with Vince and Drew again.

It was just the three of us for the next seven years. We’d join other groups sometimes, but for the most part it was just us getting into trouble and always somehow finding our way out. And we lived that life until a fourth finally joined.