The Collector and Her Steed

Chapter 12

The next couple of days went breezed by, the gashes and bruises she had obtained during her tour starting to heal up already. Thankfully she had picked up some of the herbs she had lost to Heisenberg's junk piles so she could make some salves to help the healing along. Luiza came by to check in on Mira from time to time, bringing her husband along for meals and whatnot. As the week went on Mira had met nearly everyone in the village and while some still disliked having an outsider, she could sense that they were warming up to the idea. Especially whenever she made breakfasts for the entire village to just come and take. Was she losing money doing so? Yes, however seeing the children running around enjoying pastries and the adults going off to their work with full bellies made it worth it.

Luckily for Mira, Heisenberg gave her about a week to recover enough before sending his first note containing an errand. On the slip of grease stained paper there were only two things written; steel fan blades and a large vent cover. Stuffing the paper into her pocket, Mira set out from the pub in search of duke so she could ask him if there were any junkyards or dumps nearby, other than the factory.

Getting the information she needed from Duke, Mira headed onto the path that led from the village. The Duke had said there was a dump from a neighboring town about four kilometers (roughly 2.5 miles) down the path. Making her way through the quiet forest was soothing, though the occasional rustling of leaves did startle her on occasion though it was usually just a small woodland critter being startled out of cover.

Overall it took Mira about an hour two trek through the woods down the path until she stumbled across the outskirts of the dumping area. Turning towards where she could see piles of scrap and trash, she headed in. Going through each pile took her about fifteen minutes each, since the two pieces she was looking for were larger items it'd be pretty easy to see if they were there or not. Out of the two items on the list, she found the vent cover pretty quickly which she set aside near the path so she could grab it on her way out.

After nearly two hours of searching Mira finally found a large steel fan blade, though it was pretty trashed. The metal was completely dented and the rivets were rusting but she doubted she'd be able to find another one so she scooped it up and went back to the vent cover. Securing the two items to her backpack with rope, she began her trek back to the village. In her youth her parents had taken her on a couple of backpacking trips so she was no stranger to carrying heavy packs for long periods of time, but it had been nearly ten years since she last went on one with her father so she was pretty rusty. Despite the lack of experience in recent years, she still made decent time and the extra weight on her back only added an extra twenty minutes to her hike.

The afternoon sun was starting to drift towards the west as storm clouds started approaching from the north. Mira was already stepping into the village when she took note of the storm clouds, giving them a few hours until she guessed they'd make their way to the village. That was plenty of time to bring Heisenberg his things and make it back to her place before the storm was upon them. Mira had planned on going to her place first to check on things but the storm made her rethink doing that, since she knew Heisenberg probably wasn't going to let her just drop the items and leave.

Mira made her way to the bridge that led to the factory and quickened her pace as thunder was starting up off in the distance. Hurrying along the path, she saw that the gate was wide open just for her. It took her a few minutes to make her way up to the doors she had been let out of before. Tucked away behind a pile of scrap were the actual doors that led through the factory without having to be chucked down a hole. Testing the handles, she found that the door was indeed unlocked and she slipped inside. Taking the path she had taken the week before as Heisenberg let her go, she retraced her steps all of the way back out to the lift.

It was only just now that she realized Heisenberg never told her where she should deliver the items he asked for so she went to check out the room with the golden scrawling on it. Finding the door locked she walked to the lift and hit the button for the bottom floor since that seemed to be the area where things were mostly made. As the lift brought her down through the hot factory, she peered out through the barred windows out at the expansive layout of the factory. She had only seen a small portion but she really didn't mind since she couldn't imagine all of the horrors that filled the factory's many nooks and crannies.

The lift groaned to a stop as she reached the bottom floor and she stepped out, immediately heading towards the forge room she remembered finding the first fuse in. Luckily for her all of the doors were unlocked and as she stepped into the forge she was met with a sight she was not at all prepared to see.

(A/N: Ah yes hello, I know this is a bit shorter than the other chapters but trust me. It's worth what y'all will be getting in chapter 13. I hope you all are enjoying what I've written so far, I'm pretty rusty at writing so I know it's not perfect. Heisenberg just brought the desire to write out of me, as well as the desire for a couple of other things if you catch my drift. Anyways, enjoy your read! <3)