Bleached Out Eyes

Chapter 13 - What's Your Favourite Colour, Punk?

As the sun rose the next morning, light and shadows were cast over the floor for the first time in almost a week. The wind of the storm had died down enough that the sand was no longer diffusing light, and the four who had been holled up inside the dinner started preparing to set out.

The two brothers gave their belongings a final once-over, everything having finally been freed of sand, bags included. In that time it seemed that Party had given Kobra a brief explanation of Killjoy colours, and how each Killjoy had their own colour scheme that they were identified by.

As they packed their bags, Ghoul noticed that the clothes beside Party were mostly red, blue, and grey, and the ones beside Kobra were red and yellow. They'd both arrived that first evening in coloured leathers anyway - Party in blue and Kobra in Red - so it seemed they were trying their best to work with that.

"Hey," Ghoul smiled, sitting down on the floor opposite Party, who smiled back.

"Hi, how's packing the car going?"

"It's going good, Jet's taking care of it now. He told me to come check on you guys. You working on colours?"

"We're trying to, yeah," Kobra frowned, looking at his pile of clothes, "It's difficult though. Party has far more coloured things than I do, and I really don't want to accidentally adopt someone else's colours."

Ghoul looked at the clothes that Kobra did have; mostly grey and black. There was a yellow t-shirt, a white t-shirt, and his red leather jacket. He was currently wearing black anyway, so his current attire couldn't add anything to the pile either.

"Don't worry about other people's colours," Ghoul tried reassuring him, "So long as you don't have the same colours as any of us three, then you're fine. There's only so many colour combinations you can have. For instance," Ghoul raised an eyebrow at Party, his eyes flickering to both of their left arms, and back to Kobra, "My colours are yellow and green, and Jet's and black and blue. Party's picked his as red and blue, so as long as you don't have any of those combinations then it's fine. But colours are only used as in-gang identifiers, really. Like... Gun colours, memorials, tributes for the Phoenix Witch, that kind of thing."

"So," Kobra frowned as he tried to grasp the concept fully, "I don't have to wear the exact same colours every time I change my clothes?"

"No, just as long as you keep your jacket, keep your gun, and keep your mask with you at all times, you're good. It just matters that we know who you are, what your colours are, what your mask is, what you gun looks like."

"I don't have a gun."

"What?"

"Neither of us do," Kobra repeated, like it should have been obvious, "I said the other day I hadn't fired a gun before, I don't even have one. I have a switchblade but we never got the chance to get our hands on rayguns."

Completely dumbstruck, Ghoul looked between the two brothers, mouth hanging open in disbelief.

"How in the fuck are you two still alive? Really? Nine weeks in the desert, alone, no real shelter, no fucking guns... You," he almost laughed, sighing as he shook his head, "You are very fucking lucky."

"I get that now," Kobra sounded a little sheepish, "We really weren't as prepared as we should have been, but I'm glad that Party had the good sense to drive us here when the storm hit."

"It's like someone was watching over us," Party shrugged and smiled, "Making sure we got to you and Jet safely."

Though he could hardly call the two brothers falling in through the diner door weaponless and semi-conscious arriving 'safely', Ghoul smiled at party's sentiment. Whether that had been the universe's plan for the four of them or not, he was glad things had worked out this way. 

"Maybe. Who knows, but," he sighed, "That means we've gotta go see Tommy Chow Mein. We can't have you out here with no guns. I'll let Jet know so we can make plans for where to go to first," he rolled his eyes, "Sure can't wait..."

"Who's this Tommy guy? Don't you like him?"

Ghoul leaned back against one of the seats and tried not to pout about having to visit Tommy, "He's a trader in this Zone. Pretty much everyone knows who he is, 'cause he always has the good stuff; good food, fresh batteries, brand new guns. The only problem is he's moody bastard and most of the time he only trades for carbons so he can get his stock from the City. Hopefully he'll be nice to us though, because Jet's all buddy-buddy with some of his best Zone runners."

"So," Kobra started, shuffling forwards on his seat a little more, leaning his arms on his knees, "Tomorrow, we go trading for... Food? Batteries? Weapons?"

Ghoul nodded, "Yeah, all of those. Maybe clothes too, and bedding? No offence," Ghoul glanced at the two sleeping bags, sticking out of the top of one of the bags at the trio's feet, "But sleepings bags won't cut it at the Lockup, You're gonna need blankets and shit, that place gets cold at night."

"What's the Lockup?"

"Mine and Jet's base. It's an old storage building, back from before Batt City even existed. Me and Jet keep most of our stuff there, but this diner's like a second home."

"So... The Lockup's gonna be our place too now?"

Once again, Ghoul smiled at Party's question. He reached out across the small space between them and took hold of Party's hand and gave it a gentle squeeze, looking between the redhead and the blond.

"We're a gang now, us four. It's not me and Jet, and then you two. What we have, we share; food, bedding, skills, supplies, and space. Tomorrow, when we get to the Lockup, that's home. That's our home."