The First Raider

Repetition

I was sleeping when the knocking occurred, I woke up alert, not startled. "I'm up" I shout from my bedroom. Knocker-Uppers were a thing in the town of Bohemia. They wake us up in the morning, seeing as we have no simple or inexspensive way to do it ourselves. I get up and walk through the hanging curtain which led into the only bathroom of my two bedroom shack. It's funny seeing as I'm almost forced to use one room for sleep and one as a kitchen, laundry room, gym, the list goes on... Despite my digressionial thought, I go onto clean my teeth with lukewarm tap water and a severly over-used brush. I spit out the germ-ridden water and rinse my mouth out with another mouthful of water, spit. Water's dripping down my chin when I reach for the rag I'd found in the Cafeteria earlier this month. I wipe my mouth off, staring into the cracked mirror that's showing me, the man who despite living after the nuclear war, has a dead-end, low paying job in a town where the only conflict resolution seems to be a knife to your throat or a swift kick in the butt. Good thing I stay out of peoples way. I put on my Jumpsuit, I run my fingers over the Robco™ patch and wonder what this company used to be. I sit on my bed and watch as an uncountable number of dust particles fly into the air, I take a deep breath and stare at the ground. Lacing up my boots and tucking in the legs of my pants, I glance over to my nightstand. I head over to said night stand to pick up my switchblade, it's not there, "I won't need it today" I reassure myself, "When have I ever needed it?" . After another lengthy thought, I walk over and grab the doorknob of my front door, stepping back as I open the door. The sky looks nice today. Walking through town, I see Old man Greg hunched over on the ground, a puddle of blood growing beside him. Without hesitation, I run over to him and notice that MY switchblade is hilt deep in his chest! Grabbing the hilt, I feel the warm blood on my pinky, unfazed I pull the blade out of Greg's chest and apply pressure to the wound. "What have you done!?" I hear someone from behind me shout. "Get off him!". "F*ck" I say under my breath. "It's not what it looks like!" I fumbled the words. I turn my head to see Greg's eldest son, John, sprinting at me with a look composed of fear and rage. John isnt your average guy, he works for the caravan, the Bohemian Caravan that is. So when I say that, I'm basically saying he scares the crap out of me. Still applying pressure with my left hand, I stick out an open hand in mediore defense. "Stop" I plead. John closes in in a matter of seconds and picks me up by my jumpsuit, he throws me aside and caresses his father, who by now has bled out. Almost as if he felt his father die in his arms, John slowly turns to me and weakly says "your a monster". he sobs as he pulls out his sidearm, A magnum, a single action 44. I try to get around the corner of the diner but I'm caught with a bullet in what felt like my left hip. I fall to the ground, bleeding out. Despite being in danger, I can't help but think about Lydia, the women who works with me in the water processing plant. As I'm thinking of her, my thought is broken by the sound of John being restrained by two bystanders of the shooting. Five more shots ring out, John starts sobbing, worse than before. Sheriff Mackleroy rushes to my side, calling doctors Berry and Tazz. "We need to get him to the med shack, NOW" Mackleroy bellows. I slip in and out of consciousness as I'm being carried by two, no three people. Someone has my feet, another holding my arms, and one last person holding my midsection, applying pressure to my thigh. I give up and let the darkness absorb me, which strangley feels... feels okay. So much for a normal day.