It had taken them great deal of effort and several days worth of pure, back-breaking labour to check the structure of the lumber mill and decide what needed fixing, as well as creating a rudimentary defence system by mounting the radar of the Blackbird in to their watchtower. Their to-do list wasn’t as long as Logan had feared at first, but it would keep them occupied for several weeks before the mill could be seen as a safe fort to live in.
“Find your own goddamned swarm of mosquitoes, this one is mine...” Logan growled to Scott who sat next to him on to a fallen tree trunk.
“There’s so many of them in yours, I thought we could share,” Scott said wryly, stretching his legs and crossing his ankles.
“What ever... Are the girls back yet?” Logan asked. Scott shook his head.
“I wonder what’s taking them so long. Should we go after them?” He asked. Logan shook his head.
“Better stay out of their way. I once went with Marie when she needed a pencil. A fucking pencil! By the time she was ready to go home there was no store left in that mall she hadn’t visited...”
Earlier that day Marie and Jean had left under the pretence of scouting the nearby village for supplies. That was hours ago, but both of the men were reluctant to follow them. They all needed a brief respite from each other, but it wasn’t safe to wander around alone so they split their team in half every once and a while. This was supposed to be the girl’s day off. At first Logan had been tinkering with the machines of the lumber mill, trying to see if they could get them to work. Having proper tools to prepare the lumber they’d use to repair the old building would be essential for their success. The fact that they would need proper tools and spare parts to fix the machines was rapidly becoming a hindrance.
“I have been thinking...” Scott started swatting off a mosquito that tried to make a meal out of him.
“Do you think that it’s wise to dig in and settle down?” He asked. Logan shrugged.
“We haven’t seen any humans since we... Landed,” he said, carefully avoiding the c-word.
“But there’s every chance that they might find us. The risk of contamination rises every day we spend in one place. Hell, without a proper way of diagnosing we can’t know if the food we eat is safe. We don’t know if the water in that lake is safe to drink. We don’t know... We won’t know if the virus is airborne already,” Scott rambled on.
“And we won’t know the answer to any of those until it’s too late. And those are all things we would have to consider even if we kept moving around,” Logan pointed out.
“Yes, but...” Scott tried to interject.
“There are downsides to consider no matter what we do. By settling down we can ensure that we have at least familiar and safe base to get in to if something happens.”
“Yes, but...”
“Scooter, stop thinking too much. You’re going to blow a gasket if you keep mulling over these things too long. Relax, kick your feet up and have a beer.”
“I’d have a beer if we had any...” Scott muttered with somewhat gloomy expression on his face, then tried visibly to relax.
“It’s just that lately it has seemed as if I’m the only one still thinking about these things. It’s almost as if all of you are too busy playing home to care even when the whole fucking world is crashing down on us,” he finally voiced his real gripe over matters.
“The way I see it, there’s no reason to worry over things that are out of our hands. We’ll worry over safety of our diet when we have a lab where to test everything we put in our mouth. We’ll start worrying over possible human contact when that radar on the roof of the mill starts beeping.”
“That’s your plan?” Scott snorted; looking at Logan like the other man had lost his mind.
“If something isn’t broken, why fix it?” Logan asked, then tilted his head expectantly.
“I think the girls are back.”
“Really?”
“It’s either that or we’re about to get attacked by a horde of sick people wearing heavy make-up and lots of hairspray. Smells like girls found a beauty parlour while they were away...”
Logan’s assessment of the situation couldn’t have been more correct. Originally Marie and Jean had only intended to visit the village quickly to make sure that no people, sick or healthy lived there. While they were checking up houses and public buildings they had stumbled upon a supermarket. For a long while they had just stared at it. It was nothing grand, but considering the fact that before the plague crept over lands there had lived only couple of hundred people in the village the supermarket was huge. It wasn’t part of any bigger chain that they knew of and sold products that seemed to be produced locally, but they managed to find lots of useful items from there. They had been on their way back home when they had hit the jackpot. A small hair salon. Long days spent at hard labour had left their marks on both of them, so they decided to freshen up a bit, if not for else, to lighten their moods a bit. So what had started as a semi-vacation of sorts soon turned to girl’s night out, complete with a selection of fine liqueur they raided from a mandatory liquor store next door. To say that they were a bit tipsy and giddy was to say that the Pope might just be a bit catholic.
“But we hit a mother vein while we were out there!” Marie stuttered, drunk as a skunk, leaning against the doorjamb and trying her earnest not to fall down face first.
“There’s a hardware store...” She started, then hiccupped.
“But we didn’t know what you guys needed...” Equally drunken Jean slurred, then tried to wink at general direction of the two men who were just staring at them. Since it produced no reaction whatsoever she turned to look at Marie.
“I think we made a good impression... They’re speechless!” She whispered with conspiratory tone, loud enough for both men to hear.
“It’s the lipstick...” Marie started to giggle. Soon they were both slowly falling towards the floor, rolling in a fit of uncontrollable laughter.
“Don’t look at me. I’m a lousy drunk. At that point I’m usually getting angry enough to beat up a small army...” Logan said to Scott who looked at him like he was expecting some sort of an explanation for the women’s behaviour.
“We probably should get them to bed. We can go and check up that hardware store when they’re sober enough to defend this place,” he continued and hoisted still giggling Marie on his arms. Scott followed suit with Jean.
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