Ain't Talkin'

Three miles further, Roche saw the other walker for the first time.

He’d ridden ahead again at a decent clip, and the Resistance boys were a good mile behind him, playing keep up.

The walker was a younger fellow. He’d stopped aging at around twenty-five or twenty six. His chin was a patchy rigging of stubble and bone. His eyes were sunken but bright and alert. Spry-looking and lean, he wore a hooded coat, denim trousers and boots that laced to the knee. He carried himself like a man who was armed, but Roche could see no obvious weapon on him. A motorbike stood on it’s kickstand by the side of the road.

As he rode up on the walker, Roche puts his palms up. I-come-in-peace.

The hooded walker shifted his weight from one foot to the next. He didn’t move, he didn’t say a word, just stood there.

“Woah.” Roche halted Lucky twenty paces from the walker and put one boot on the asphalt, keeping the other in the stirrup. He tipped his hat.

“Howdy!” Roche made an attempt at being jovial, but it sounded false.

“Oy. Who’re you?” The walker tipped his head and put his hands on his hips. The way he bent Roche could tell he had an irritatingly long barreled pistol tucked in the waistband of his pants.

“Name’s Roche.”

“Then howdy, Roche. I’m Thomas.” He smiled a little, showing pristinely white teeth and creases around his eyes. He said howdy like it was a foreign word to him. “You with the Resistance?”

“Suppose I am. You?”

“Suppose, suppose. Hired by a man named Miner a few months back. He asked me to meet him in the Sierra’s along the 80. He on his way?”

“Yeah, he’s a bit behind. Not too far.”

“I can tell. You boys throw up quite the dust cloud. I saw you coming miles off.”

“Well, the trucks do make a racket and throw up some dirt.” Roche turned and looked back at the 80. True, for someone looking up the road it was obvious they were approaching.

“How many are you?” Thomas asked, taking a couple steps forward, hands still on his hips.

“Don’t matter. How much longer until we’re out of the mountains?”

“Couple hours at your pace.” Thomas looked over Roche’s shoulder at the approaching caravan, bearing down on them, and then back West along the dwindling road.

He was probably right, the air was thickening already. Soon they would be in the California Basin and approaching Sacramento.

“There’s a town called Colfax down the road another hour. The boys in the caravan need a rest and a meal?” Thomas asked.

Roche considered this. “No. What they need is to keep barreling down this road until we hit New San Fran if there’s any chance of heading off the Corp.”

“That’s what this is all about.” Thomas said smirking. He turned and swung a leg over the old motorbike he’d probably jibbed off of an unsuspecting wastelander. He kicked down the start and the engine rumbled. He chocked the bike and it rumbled louder and louder, a breathing, groaning beastly sound.

When the walker called Thomas pulled his hood back to slip riding goggles over his eyes Roche could see that his hair was close-cropped, and his scalp cris-crossed with scar tissue. Young though he might have been when he entered the white for the first time, and younger than Roche still, but this was a man who’d seen his share of shit.

“Shall we ride back and meet up with the caravan then?” Thomas called over the bumble and roar of his bike’s engine.

“You can, I’ll be waitin’ here.”

“Suit yourself, Roche.” Thomas started, stopped and turned back over his shoulder to shout another question. “Why just the last name, Roche!?”

“Why just the first, Thomas?” Roche quipped back. The other walker laughed, shook his head placatingly and rode back up the 80 East to meet the Resistance caravan and his employer who’d apparently hired him months back.

Sitting in his saddle again, Roche watched the skyline and smoked a rolled cigarette. He heard the caravan slow and stall, presumably when Thomas rolled up to meet them. A minute later the caravan started back up again. When the caravan rolled by, Roche spurred Lucky into motion and fell in with them.

The Resistance now had two walkers in tow, and was well on their way to New San Fran.