Chapter two: Rolling Wood?
Spring trip? But we never go on vacations...
Roxas peered up quizzically at his uncle beside him, who was currently busy with a map and random mumbling to notice. Not bringing much hope of a conversation.
And, it had begun a lite rain...
Looking out of the carriage window, he resided to thinking fore a while, watching in resolved silence as people on the streets ran to and yonder, hoping for an ecape from the drizzles of water. The water between the red bricks of the streets sort of fizzled around the sharp edes of the stone; forming tiny streams of water gushing into the city drains. It reminded him a liitle of the fountain back home, except that it particularly had lost most of it's luster over the years, no longer spewing fresh water, but more likely leaking it unto the driveway every evening. Just one of the many things that made randsom seem like home.
Wow, It was really getting dark out...
"Um, Xigbar?"
Few a few moments he was not acknowledged, but rather they carried on in silence while the footfalls of horses hooves carried them further into the outskirts of town; were the large clock tower London was known for could even barely be seen. With a low growl of fustration, the older man peered away from his paper and sighed.
"What, Roxas?"
"Why are we going on vacation? Y-you never mentioned it before..."
The stare he recieved was almost entranced like, until a chuckle sent the old man back to browsing his paper.
"You don't what to take a little trip? I thought you hated the city life." he looked up and sighed, " And now you want to stay. Wow, you're strange for your age..."
"No, it's just- you never said anything about it ahead of time and- Its so sudden.."
Almost no sooner than he spoke, he was interrupted as a voice from somwhere outside and above mingled with the rain. " The kid's got a point. Someone may think you're losin your head to wanna travel in this weather! There aint nothin wrong with skippin a party..." a little pause and then, "...And with all those recent murders goin' around, that may not be a bad idea this late at night..."
" M-murders?"
Xigbar held a head outside of his window and frowned," We're first class, Sid! Top dog! We can't just "skip out..." And were have you been hearing about all this crime, huh? I told you you gotta stop believin' that stuff!"
He came back into the warmth of the carraige, head dripping with rain as he waited for an answer.
"Well, this guy down at the Raven seemed to know what he was talkin about, blabberin' on and on about how just last week ole' Smith Regard was found dead as a rail in his post office, big ole' blade in his spine."
"Tike's Smith Regard? The crazy guy from Parsons?"
"That's him. And 'member how they used to favor that Mr. Connors so much? Heh. Not anymore. The old dude just up and goes to the Train Route 60 for awhile, and...Bam! Find him hangin' from his own tie in the entrance.
" Stop!"
Roxas really didn't want to hear any more of it all, covering his ears in hope to keep any more tales of murder out of his head. A soft laugh and a poke in the rib shook him up a bit.
" Oh, whats up kid? Cid there didn't scare you up there, did he?"
He took his hands from his ears and shook his head quickly.
"Um, no. Its- just.. Let's change the subject."
"Alright, alright. Fine".
A brief silence followed, and soon after, the gentle beat of horse feet could be heard paving against the wet dirt road. It lasted about thirty-minutes, and soon the scarred man to the right of Roxas couldn't resist the erge to speak again.
"Well I don't really know about all that, but I will say that the old cheapskates probably deserved what they got, especially after that big rip off scandal they found themselves tryin to put on the market. I mean, who the hell gave those two the idea of a partnered contract in the first place?"
" Oh I don't know. What i say is they're probably just anxious about their new inventory. They think its really gonna sell ya know? Big If. They probably wont even go through the trouble to build the stuff right in the first place. Like yesterday. I went on over to see about some new wheels for the carraiges, and what do i find? Stuff that wouldn't be worth 5 pounds, thats what! Touch a hinge, and the whole darn thing's about ready to crumble into a crappy piece of shi-"
CLA-THUM thuum thuum Trrrmp!
a jerk and a bump sent the carraige into an abrupt hault with a screech, sending two heads caving against the interior of the coaches hard shell.
"Speak of the devil!..."
Roxas rubbed the now sore spot of his head and moaned, watching out of the window as a gaping hole now lay in the rear of where a fourth wheel should have been. He squinted out into drizzling rain.
"What happened? ...Why'd we stop?"
The lite sound of the reins were heard falling carelessly to the ground, two feet making thier way to the back of the wagon in a slow shuffle. Soon followed by the furious slamming of the carriage door .
" Just a another wheel, kid. Just another earth damned wheel..."
An obstacted piece of wood was wrapped up tightly in the hands of one of the men, and held out distinctly before Roxas' eyes to see .
" This part most likely came from the inside of the thing" he said. "You see that inside? Pure cardboard. A perfect example of what I mean by cheap."
Roxas observed it for a moment, taking it from Sid's hands and turning it round with his fingertips to get a better look of it. He tapped the center piece towards the center of his palm, leaving it to churn with the rain and disentegrate into a mess on his hands.
Wow it's- really is worthless...
He brushed off the pieces onto the ground, tiny shards of wood left to tumble into the dark rain; other traces of it rolling into the shadows the wagon, hidden forever.
One of these pieces, however, ran into niether of these places.
On, and on, a single shard of wood ran oveer the wet red dirt of the country road, never stopping, never slowing down until it lay before the presence of an obscured walkway; a few 10 ft. away from where they had stopped.
Peering through the window he strained to see through the falling drops of water as he watched it roll away, and then stop.
I wonder where...
Looking around to see that the two men had begun argueing over the state of the wheel, and were not minding him, he slowly unlatched the door to the outside; stepping out unto the cold dirt of a pavement. He eyed the place carefully where the wood had stopped rolling, part of him actually wondering why he even cared; and why he was out into the cold and rainy darkness of the nightime- curiosity getting the best of him. All in all, he just wasn't sure. But something in him wanted to know where that piece was going... or where it went...