Gold Or Gone

Chapter 8 | Aboard

The night was awfully quiet, eyes shuttered , capturing the dark ceiling that blended into their sleep. The next morning was bright, they opened their eyes to the beams of light that penetrated the window, lighting up the room. 

"You sure you don't wanna say byes or something?" asked Leah, to which Mercury took a brief pause and climbed the jeep. Ak and Leah followed. As such they bid farewell to Dgarlan, never looking back once.

Once evening arrived they stopped the jeep and jumped down. Mercury and Leah took on the task to setup camp while AK refueled the jeep. After all was done they sat down on the plastic sheet they placed on the ground outside the tents. Facing the fire, Mercury said. 

"Listen up, from now I'm Lucas, you're Ava and William. We'll be totally different people than who we are right now and live a different life. Never look back. From now on we're one family, Thorne."

William passed some canned food to Ava and Lucas. 

"all right, now what's the game plan?", asked William.

"We go to town and get some weapons first, get one pistol and a dagger for each of us. also keep on lookout for common medicine. Ill look for long lasting food, the food they give on the ship will be barely eatable I'm assuming". replied Mercury, now Lucas. 

"Then ill get us some clothes. Since we'll be travelling in the winter, we'll need them a lot", added Ava. 

"Fine, Here's some money, should be enough.", Lucas passed two bags of silver coins to Ava and William and crawled into his tent. Will and Ava followed. 

The next day they arrived in the town and separated as planned. Through shady alleys and crowded streets they travelled on lookout for desired goods. 

Walking through town he found one alley in particular intriguing. It was a narrow alley across which there seemed to have bright lights, no other alleys opened up to another street but this one definitely did. Cautiously he waddled through the alley to find himself in a whole new market. This one way less crowded that the main one. 

Although it was less crowded William's gut urged him to leave at once. It was evident he had entered the black market. Many gangs participated in these types of markets and it was not unheard of to never walk out them again. He knew this was the place he could purchase weapons and hence gathered the blades of courage he had to step forward. 

The market sold everything illegal. Mercenaries and hitmen roamed around while concealing artillery. Shops sold every type of substance there was and in 5 minutes he saw atleast 10 shops that sold automatic rifles. hesitantly he went to the shops and asked them for the price with a simple question. 

"How much?" while pointing to the different models they had.

He soon found out that all shops had their prices different, the simple AK type rifle ranged from around 60g of silver to 200g converted. he went around and purchased 3 p38s, a model 29 and a 47 along with around 300 rounds of 9mms, 60 of .492 and 500 of 7.62s along with 3 sharp 8 inch daggers. the total came out to be 500g silver. He knew better than to try to negotiate so he paid as is. On his way back he bought some hooded garments to hide the AK on his back, tucked the pistols on his waistband hidden by his needlessly big t-shirt and carried the bullets in a white plastic box. by the time he returned to the camp it was 6 in the evening and the sun had started to set.

Ava(Leah) was watching the fire to make sure it doesn't go out while Lucas(Mercury) was inside packing. William greeted Ava and headed inside the tent. He gently tapped Lucas's shoulder and he turned around.

"Welcome back, how did it go?" asked Lucas. William sat down besides him and pulled out the p38s, 29 and the AK. 

"that's it?" asked Lucas to which William pulled out the daggers and laid all the items on the ground in between them. "300 9mms for the pistols, 60 .492s for the revolver, 500 7.62s for the AK.", both of them became silent as Lucas inspected the weapons. 

"Good job. I've packed 3 months worth of rations in our bags separately, jerky, hardtack and a lot of canned food. Leah got us some nice backpacks so that's what we'll be taking. We each got 5 pairs of basic clothes. I'll take a pistol and dagger, take the 47 with you AK, and Leah can have the 29. There's a small ship sailing south tomorrow morning down south. be prepared". Lucas got up and walked outside the tent. William stopped him and asked, "Are you sure about this? we've barely ever stepped outside our city? do you think we can make it in a whole another country?"

William stared at Lucas's back with a nervous gaze. After a moment of silence Lucas spoke, "We don't have a choice we're either going to make it or die in the process, I'll accept death only after I've tried everything", as he walked away and to his own tent. 

Moments after they gathered by the fire to have dinner, the air felt heavy and the sky felt infinitely far. The trio ate silently and went to sleep without much to say but none of them could fall asleep with ease. Nonetheless, the clock ticked and soon it was time to depart.

They crawled out of their tents and greeted each other. The clock read 6AM. They prepared themselves for the ride, their backs heavy, triple checked everything and soon it was time to board. The took down their tents and packed them in their bags. Without looking back they headed into town and to the port. Their walk there was quiet. A long line awaited them when they reached the registration for boarding, In the cruel heat of the summer they were made to stand for 2 hours before it was their turn to register. The registration really only required their name, age and a photograph. They didn't even bother checking them for weapons. After registration they climbed the stairs to the only deck after which they were escorted to rooms below the deck with 2 bunk beds per room. 

The Thornes settled into their room and stared out the window waiting for the ship to start sailing, 
that was until...