Gabriel’s Watch - Book One: The Scrapman Trilogy Read Free Page A

fine. Just thought you should know. We might be hearing about it later.”
    “And they didn’t follow you back here,” she said, more of a statement than a question.
    “Not a chance,” I smiled.
    “Oh ... good.” She began to return to her work.
    “I think it’s time we get some guns,” I added.
    She looked back up at me. “Guns?”
    “Yeah, guns. The government is getting stronger, more and more people are joining, and they’re reaching farther toward the edge of the city—toward us.”
    Alice nodded. “If you want to get some guns, then get some guns. Believe me—I’m the last person in the world you need to convince; you’ve just wanted to stay away from them for so long, that’s all.”
    She was right. Ever since the mutiny we witnessed ten years before, I’d taken an unspoken vow to never pick up a firearm—especially with Alice around. But over the years, she’d proven herself much stronger than I would ever have anticipated.
    “I know. But I think now’s the time, especially when I’ve had to go deeper and deeper into the city. It’s silly not to have a gun anymore.”
    “I agree,” she said, looking back at the mechanical mess before her.
    If anyone could piece that thing together, if anyone could turn that madness into something operational, it would be Alice. She’d long since obtained my complete confidence when it came to mechanics and engineering
    “So what’s the ETR on the ZEKE machine over there?” I asked.
    “Um ... I think I can have it together in a couple days, but we’re short a few proxes and so forth.” She made a face that was less than positive. “I don’t know exactly how he’ll react to his new body—we might be back at the drawing board next week.”
    “What happened to your self-confidence?” I teased.
    “It’s still here, along with my integrity—I’m just being honest.” She held her arms out, displaying the area in which we were having this conversation. “We’re not exactly living below a Home Depot and this isn’t exactly a professional machine shop. I’m doing the best I can.”
    “I know,” I fumbled, trying to recover after inadvertently hitting a nerve. “I was just kidding. You’re awesome and I’m an idiot.”
    “Thanks,” she agreed wholeheartedly.
    As much as I would’ve loved to stay and watch the miracle of her engineering, I left Alice to her craft, knowing how much she truly enjoyed her privacy.
    With the flip of a switch I initiated a set of reflector photo-eyes to alert us of any movement upstairs; they were set in a grid-like pattern, so nothing entered without tripping at least one of them. It usually signified what we were having for breakfast that morning, and rarely warned us of anything other than a wild animal, but I found it never hurt to take a few extra precautions. We had some traps up there as well, but—more often than not—it was a rather unlucky raccoon falling for those.
    That’s actually how we caught Alice’s tabby cat; discovering the feline swinging from one of our trip-lines, we cut her down only to find a very thankful and irresistible ball of purring fur. And after one challenging bath, and very little debate, Alice had settled on the name Dinah. She continued to adore that cat.
    Our power, you might be wondering, came from a series of solar panels we’d salvaged from all over. They were placed out of sight atop the junkyard and wired all the way to our secret cavern beneath.
    A very small shack upstairs was used as a decoy, keeping passersby from asking an abundance of questions regarding my living situation. In reality we had a water-purification system, a power system, a relatively constant food supply, and even a small sewage system; as far as the end of the world was concerned—we were sitting pretty.
    The night reached that brittle-stiff calm when closing on the midnight hour—time to get some rest. Alice would surely be up until early morning, hammering it out until it was just