» Fri May 27, 2011 2:31 pm "Come on girl, do the man," Lock spoke beside her. He's the one that brought the man here. Said he had a lesson for her to learn. A universal lesson about learning to throw one's self into fates hand. Jane didn't know what he meant, but figured she would soon learn.
Her slender hand tightened around the iron handle of her pistol, "You ready mister," she said with a shaky voice. The man didn't answer, just coughed.
"He ain't no mister, just dirty like the rest of us," Lock spoke walking up next to her, his smokey breath upon her neck, "Killin is a release of the soul, a simple pull and the world opens its doors."
She steadied her hand, closed her eyes, and pulled. The pistol recoiled, launching her arm backwards. The smell of gun smoke filled the air, and the taste of iron touched her lips. Her heart pounded in thirst of the rush. And she opened her eyes to see the bloody pulp of the man before her. Jane didn't understand the feeling inside her, disconnected, detached, but no remorse. She couldn't feel anything, but she knew she had killed.
"That's it girl, just like your mama," Lock said as he bent over the dead body and took out his knife, "Might wanna walk away now child, don't wanna spoil all your innocence."
That night Jane sat by a campfire. She thought about what Lock said, about her being like her mother. Her mother always wore a dress, even on the coldest nights. She never said anything wrong like other people in the wasteland, or disturbing. Her mother told Jane stories till she fell asleep, her mother never killed a man.
"Eat up, tomorrow goin to be a big day," Lock spoke as he laid down.
Jane looked at the charred flesh in her hand and picked at it with her fingernails. Need to eat to survive, she thought. Her eyes closed as she brought a piece of the flesh to her mouth and chewed then swallowed. Jane knew she wasn't like her mother, her mother was a saint and she was some kind of ghoul. A ghoul that had the flesh of girl, but the soul of a monster.
After dinner, Jane had to take watch. She despised the loneliness of watch, she never found any peace out in the Wasteland. All her life she only knew rotten trees and ruined buildings; never a soul in sight, nothing but shades of grey and brown. Her stomach gave a rumble. Meat never seemed to settle right either, made her feel sick, but Lock said it just takes time for her digestive system to adapt. But she hadn't grown accustom to many things, she wished her mother was still alive. That her mother would tell her everything is okay.
"I killed a man," she whispered to herself. But again she felt no remorse, just a sickening feeling that she would need to sleep once Lock woke to take watch. Tomorrow would come, like it always does. Tomorrow and then the next day, a never ending struggle of survival, then poof she's dead. What if she couldn't survive the waste, couldn't adapt to live. She let her hand rest upon the cold handle of her pistol. She once heard that sleeping is like dying, you just wake up in another world. She raised the pistol to her head. One bullet and she would never have to sleep again. But taking her own life was a lot harder than taking someone else's, so she let her hand fall and stared at the crude pistol.
"Death make a coward of us all," Lock spoke from behind her, "Learn that little line from a man called Shakespeare, suppose to be someone from the olden days."
A stench of sewage filled the air as he sat next to her, his dark eyes staring into the night, "Thought you would do it, you know take your life. I didn't wanna speak, afraid I would ruin the moment." He pulled out a canteen and took a swig then passed it to her. Jane smelt the alcohol inside and took a drink to feel the liquid burn as it went down, and she began to cough.
"Ain't many things to keep one movin, but a good drink never fail me," Lock spoke.
"What did you mean, when you said I was just like my mother?"
A smile creased across his dirty face, "Your mama was the devil in disguise. Would swoon a man into givin her everything, then take from him everything."
"My mother ain't no devil," Jane spoke standing up and facing him.
Lock laughed, took another swig, "Just payin you a compliment, ain't nothin rude in what I said. Just the truth."
She raised the pistol and pointed it at Lock, "I'll kill you where you sit."
"We'll look it here, a true born killer," He walked up to the pistol till the barrel pressed against his head, "Come on now, pull the trigger, ain't nothin here worth livin for."
Jane couldn't pull the trigger just like she couldn't take her own life, her life and Lock were the last securities of her world. She needed Lock, in a way he's the only family she had left. The only lover her mother actually kept around. It's strange trying to have something proper in world gone so wrong, her mother said once when they were living at some abandoned motel.
"Like a needle and a thread, we keep fixin, that's what my mother told me once. You keep fixin Jane, fixin till that end comes then you can rest. And that's what I intend to do," She spoke as she handed over the pistol.
Lock put the pistol in his pants, "Can't fix where there ain't no fixin wanted. You want some wise words, you forget what your mama told you and you learn to accept your situation."
"I'm tired of waking up to you," Jane spoke as she walked away towards a struggling fire.
"Better get used to this mug girl, this mug gonna get you through this."
