Wasteland Samurai Ch. 1

  Foggy eyes gazed upon the veiled world around him as his head and thoughts spun parallel. Skin was burnt from the sun, scratched by the grainy shards that blew in the wind. Left appendages lie as dead metal weight clogged with dusty sorrow and smashed by an unknown source. Excess parts were strewn around Samuel's body and everywhere else, some flying through the air as the tinkerer, in his own way, casually searched for replacement parts. He scratched his balding head with the curly snow around his ears before sweeping his arm across the table, sending parts on a less than welcomed goodbye on their part from their position.
  "I was sure I had those parts round here somewhere. It's just a god damn hose and a few pieces of plate metal."
  Samuel shifted on the steel table. His metal appendages hung off and dragged him to the floor. He was ignored, even as he attempted to crawl to the door. He made snails progress with the weight of the dead limbs. A few more junk parts flew across the room from inside a greasy wooden box in the corner. The old man cried out in victory, tossing the parts onto his workbench and leaving them momentarily to fetch the man crawling on his floor.
  "Son, you ain't gonna get very far crawling like that."
  Samuel flopped onto his back like a dead fish. His skin glistened with effort from the exertion from point A to nearly-point-B.
  "I won't have you butchering my body!"
  The old man sighed angrily and dragged Samuel by his dead arm. Try as he might, he was unable to fight the old man as he was dragged much like a kicking and screaming toddler. With some manner of effort he was able to roll Samuel back onto the steel table. He set the plate metal and hose down next to Samuel with force before grabbing the limb-wrench. He placed it in the holes and pressed the dirty white button and the limb slammed to the table. He repeated the simple process with the arm and took them both to the workbench. The time consuming part was the cleaning. They were clogged with dirt and dust - easy to clean - but the shame and guilt would never wash out.
   The moon greeted the man through his window as a cool night breeze constantly whispered through the air and merrily brushed past his Santa-white hair. At dusk he had dragged Samuel to a bed and left him a share of sustenance in the form of bread and meat and gravy with a creamy drink made from warm sheep's milk, soaked rice and cinnamon.
  The old man sat on his front porch in the welded rocking chair he made with matching foot rest. A cooler filled with ice and cold local brews sat within arm’s reach, the bottle currently in use always resting somewhere between his body and his scatter gun. He would stare at the label, a blonde woman and a brown haired woman in front of a colorful orange and yellow background, each symbolizing the different types of brew made by the brewery. He readied himself when he heard the sounds of effort coming from inside. Gun and brew in hand, he casually walked in and found Samuel attempting to make his way to his limbs, now fully repaired and duded up with a few shiny new plate panels that glistened with promise, and a new compressor hose near the core on the bicep that would pump hope into his veins.
  "You must've been out in that desert for a whole heap-a hours to have me spend all night getting the gunk out. The rest was simple. Even greased up the hinges for ya."
  Samuel breathed hard with human exhaust as he wobbled and leaned against the wall.
  "I need to get back. I need to go home."
  The old man took a drink from his brew and nodded. He helped Samuel over to his couch, a nice one in its heyday made from colored hemp and cotton with nylon decoration that was all but loose string these days. The cushions were flat and worn from years of sitting and shifting. Samuel found it a comfortable seat as his limbs were painfully reattached.
  "Stay here for about a week until yer feelin' good enough to travel. Home'll still be there in the meantime."
  The lights on the arm and leg lit up white and moved like they were fresh from the box on Christmas morning.
  "Thank you for your help, sir."
  The old man stood, grabbed two brews from the ice swimming in his cooler and popped both tops. Samuel lightly took hold of the soaked brown bottle as the chill of it danced up his arm and made a home on the back of his neck.
  "Name's Jerimiah Hook. You might want to invest in a projection to cover up those parts. They're real high quality. It wouldn't have surprised me at all to see ya without them when I found ya in the sand."
  Samuel quickly finished his gu lp and inquisitively set the bottle aside.
  "How was it that you came across my body?"
  Hook took a slow embarrassed drink before wiping his bushy mustache and scratchy face.
  "Well," he began with a sprinkle of shame, "it wasn't with the noblest intentions, I'll tell ya that much. The Dogs of War gang that rules the sands outside of Denzi like to dump bodies there. I go there to scavenge the dead for limbs like yours, fix 'em up easy, and sell 'em for a good bit o' scratch. It's difficult work seein' as sweepers are no use, what with all the bullets. I would imagine you had a brush with 'em to end up in that spot, but ya weren't riddled with lead. At first, it was just your hand sticking out o' the ground. I'd never seen an arm like that before, and in such good condition to boot! When I dug ya out, it was against my better judgment to take you, but, like the limb, I've never seen anyone survive a run-in with the DOW. By the way, what'd you do to piss them off?"
  Samuel thought he knew the answer, but blanks were drawn at every turn. Memories once as vivid as motion pictures were now a black canvas that confused and shocked him. He fought like a man would against his own paralysis. Sympathetic eyes warmly embraced him from his sad seat.
  "Well, whatever you did, they don't usually just leave people alive out there unless you're lucky enough to survive an entire clip of double ought."
  Samuel stood with the weight of invisible burdens wrapped around his shoulders.
  "Please, excuse me for a while. I have to gather my thoughts."
  Hook said nothing and watched as the man shrouded in mystery walked out of his humble home and into the heart of the town. The square was freshly born for the morning with fresh faces trundling to their places of business, whether indoors or under the smiling sun. Feet clad in flapping leather and mousy rubber bustled quietly over the packed dirt to the shops. Labored faces that bathed in sun daily with red-roasted necks drove their guarded caravans to the smaller outlying camps where they would mine coal or iron and others who would spend the day preparing stucco, which was always easy and cheap and nobody hated it. Day traders are almost hermits in their stores during daylight, not coming out for anything less than closing or lunch. At night, some of them would tronce right up to the whore house and walked in with toothy grins. The busty women in frilly dresses who stood out front always encouraged the less than willing and less than proud to come in with head held high, no matter which it may be.
  The square held all the big business except guns. A shop just off the square, quaint and small with a sign that held the hours, opening just as Samuel shuffled somberly by stood nobly between two sad, rundown buildings. One was set to be torn down and reconstructed into cheap housing. The crew was preparing their dingy facial protection to begin hammering away at the walls and foundation. The other building was to be razed to be turned into an extension for the existing gun shop, a shooting range for the customers to test their would-be life-snatchers and home-defenders.
  Farther down the street, Samuel found himself at the wooden archway that Hook had driven home through as he lay almost lifeless in the bed of his truck. He could see the phantom memory as he eyed the numerous tracks in the dirt from busy vehicles. There was an old woman who every day sat in front of the school down the west road. She always carried a music box with her. Music boxes are a rarity, a few always being peddled in a shop or shown off to children by someone lucky enough to have inherited one. The ones from Nether, the oasis across the sea, are the rarest and play a most unique and complex and hauntingly beautiful song, just one song, never anything different. They would be easier to imitate if not for the silver. The angelic filigree adorning the macabre beauty was a sight to behold. You would definitely count yourself among one of the lucky few to own one, much less to hear the tune dinging magnificently, perfectly from inside.
  Samuel took three steps out the front gate before a sweaty man guarding the gate from ground level - the other two were in little towers to either side of the gate - noticed him from the corner of his heavy eye.
  "Hey!" He ran up to Samuel with a sudden burst of energy at a goings-on, no matter the insignificance of it. "Don't go too far from town. The DOW are never too far from here. They have scouts that lay in the dunes and on top of cliffs."
  "Don't worry." Samuel responded with low-toned kindness. "What's the closest city from here?"
  The guard took off his helmet and scratched his youthful, shaggy, golden head. "What direction you intend on going?"
  "I intend to make my way to Silver Phoenix by way of the Libra City steamer."
  The young man strained his face for a blip. "Can't say I ever heard of Silver Phoenix. Libra City is pretty far away, though. You have to head north up to Lion's Mane. Now, that's directly connected to Leo by way of skyrail. Then you head east until you're out of the mountains and then you adjust your track a little northward. If you can't find it, you probably went too far north."
  Samuel graced the man with kindness before turning back. Hook was sawing logs on the old couch with a spilled brew on the floor by his limp noodle of an arm and a hand-knitted green blanket gently hugging his plump body. Samuel sat on the porch watching life happen around him while he contemplated his journey. Lion's Mane is a small town, maybe only one-hundred seventy people, populated mostly by the military of Leo to protect the skyrail. Military doesn’t go beyond that point. They say that Leo, the mountain city, is a wonder to behold. Maybe half of the city is on top of the mountain with the other half built inside like the stories of fabled dwarves.
  When the sun could no longer hold itself in the sky and decided to go to bed, Samuel decided it was time to set out. Though he could work and not be a hindrance to Hook, he thought it best to begin his trek. Hook clamped down on his metal arm as Samuel began to walk.
  "I got an old crawler in storage. It's nowhere near perfect, but at least you won't have to walk."
  The key scratched inside the lock and the door shed the dusty husk of nonuse to reveal the equally dingy crawler. It sat alone, longing for company in the pitch dark of solitude that would drive men mad had they been there as long. Faded and chipped yellow paint colored the steel bars, the leather seat was canyoned with cottony cracks, and more than one critter had made a home in the air between the bars at one point or another. The white eyes of the tiny vehicle were caked with filth that clouded their vision.
   "She's somethin' to be desired, but she'll get you from A to B. I'll have to give her a bit of a push to get her started. If it runs long enough, you shouldn't have that problem too terribly often."
   Samuel admired the cold steel, the course leather, and the dusty parts that would roar to life on command. A solitary key was placed in his palm. The duo pushed the old girl out into the sleepy sun, slowly settling in to bed, and her colors were invigorated. Hook wiped his cheerful cherry brow. Dust puffed from the seat when Samuel plopped himself in. His solemn gaze looked skyward at the shadowed figure of the man who put his pieces back together.
   "Thank you," he quietly said with the utmost humility. His mouth hung open, his mind wanting him to spit more out but they were caught in his throat. He only managed to repeat what he had already said before Hook instructed him to turn the key. It hummed to life like a giant steel cat.
  Hook placed a bag on the passenger seat with water, dried meat, and enough scratch to pay for a few nice meals and a warm bed. He also placed two old mechanical legs in the floor that he had fixed up. If all else failed, he could barter with them or sell them to a parts store. He was again thanked, making his gratitude known thrice over.
  Wasting no more time, Hook gave it a push for a good thirty feet before he tired out and hunched over with exhaustion, panting and wheezing and looking forward to a fresh brew. The crawler was well on its way, leaving a trail of momentary inconvenience for passersby.
  The moon soothed the golden sands as Samuel sped along them like a Gerridae. From the flats where he put the spurs to it, past any sort of distance where the town could be seen, he could see the outlying dunes. They waved in picturesque fashion like motionless waves of the sea, forever frozen in perfect beauty.
  Magnified glass eyes with thundering mouths stared down the lone man. They all began to shout as their spit made dull entrance into the sand and others through the rubber feet of the crawler. As the bare metal of the front hub dug into the sand, it acted as a brake. As more shots came his way, more rubber was shredded and the crawler rolled and rolled. Panicked as he was, Samuel held tight, but as it kept turning over on itself with such force, his grip would be torn from him. He was flung from the crawler as it rolled over him, partly burying him in the nighttime sands and leaving him motionless.