Battery Life

1%

10-1011-1011 11-111 1101-10-11-101 001-10-00-1 0-000 0-1111-1 011-1-111-1001-1-101-10-0-1

Battery Life

1%

"Just look a li'l harder, Lex. We'll find somethin'."

"Not with this score, we won't," the young girl grumbled. She glared at him from a few yards away, an edge of tiredness in her tone.

She was too young to be doing work like this. Only nine or so, with a skinny build that gave away her lifestyle of scavenging and malnutrition. Her face still had a childish edge to it, albeit hidden under a permanent glare and almost ever-present scowl; she had a lovely tan that would be a coppery sheen if it wasn't covered in grime and smudges. Her semi-long, dark hair was pulled back into a messy, tangled ponytail that would lightly thump between her shoulder blades when she jerked or jumped—which was often.

She would look pitiful if she wasn't so sharp-mouthed, and perhaps decently pretty if she were dusted off and given some cosmetic appeal; but he thought that she fit the bill perfectly for an alley-crawling street-smart scavenger, almost as sharp as himself.

"Tha's what you said 'bout the one mound, didn't you?" he inquired. "We found a whole telly in there."

"Because things always seem to show themselves when you're hopeless and tired and hungry," Lex complained, rolling her eyes. She ducked back into the scrap heap she was rutting around in with several more complaints under her breath, her steadily-loosening hair tie vanishing behind her.

"I like to think'f it as destiny telling you to take a break," he scoffed. "Or telling you to get out of its beeswax."

"Ha. Ha. Ha," her dry laugher echoed on the metal she was surrounded in.

He frowned in her direction before turning back to the task before him. He was tiered and messy too, yet he wasn't complaining; that was a female thing, apparently, to complain to empty air about how hopeless you feel. He'd never do that. He'd loath it internally, instead.

His worn shoes scuffed up the ground beneath him as he approached the pile, tossing up little dust clouds that swirled aimlessly in his wake; they were soon destroyed by the wind gusts that hounded the dump, carrying away air born debris and chilling any semi-hopeful scavengers to the bone. Not like they weren't already chilled, granted their lifestyle, but it made them that much more cold.

He came close enough to a shiny plate of metal to see his reflection. It was warped by the bent, scratched-up steel, but he could still make out his shape. His lean build was magnified and thinned out by the outward curve, making an athlete out of an underfed teenager; his blonde hair became fans of a white-gold color instead of an overgrown rat's nest that hung past his ears with a weak state of permanent frizz. All the little white scars and gray smudges were omitted by it, but it seemed intent on focusing his bright blue eyes into ethereal markings on his face.

It was a nice image. He stored the idea of a warped mirror's reflection in his head before grabbing the edges of the metal plate (some sort of car hood in its past life, he presumed) and hauling it to a meager pile of somewhat valuable things.

Xave had been living this life for years now. He wasn't entirely sure when he stopped being a drag and started dragging others, but it was some time ago, as his memories of a warm house and abundant food were blurry and distant. They would bob up from his subconscious in dreams at times, random and without pattern, little bursts of sweet hope and wishes that struck as randomly and powerfully as lightning. They were steadily getting further and further apart as his old life drifted ever so further away.