The mountains of junk clogged the skyline from compass end to compass end; broken down cars and piles of tires and the swollen lumps of chairs that bled cotton from their punctured bodies. They all stacked in giant piles.

"Why’d you ask me to meet you here?" Dion asked.

"To help me, you need a favor and so do I. That’s how this works," Thaddeus roamed the stretch of dirt, going car to car and inspecting each.

"I have a murderer chasing after me, how in the hell could your problems be worse than mine."

"I get it, you're in trouble, but you should be more considerate for me, okay?" Thaddeus said. "I’m scared too. I had no idea I was getting myself into when I came over here, no idea! We’re both in trouble,"

"We?"

"Yeah, you think I wanted to come here? I'm in the same boat as you, I’m an outcast!"

"What does that mean?" Dion asked.

"It means I’m a bit screwed w-w-with the c-c-church," He coughed. “Sorry, I s-s-stutter when I’m n-nervous.”

“Sorry,”

“You think you’re the only one with problems?”

He was ashamed to say yes, though he did feel that in his heart. For a while, he had felt like no one but him mattered in the world. And maybe Dion was indulging in his narcissism, but it seemed fair to him. He started counting down his problems; the addiction to sex, the fear of losing violent control, the flying spike-throwing witch. Yeah, it seemed fair to only think about himself. Which was weird to him, considering how much he cared about others in Havenbrook. It was all weird and all new to him.

He sighed. Havenbrook. The boy, the people. He leaned against a junk car, some shitty rusted Toyota. The people at the motel too, all slaughtered.

He wished he wasn’t guilty. He wished he could just forget that other people even mattered, and maybe he was close to forgetting, but it always seemed to come back to him again.

"No, I'm not the only one with problems." Dion’s muttered. His breath was long-drawn. His eyes, tired.

"Yeah, buddy. I got banned from the church too," Thaddeus said. "Excommunicated, and if I don't help you, soon-to-be-executed."

"What'd you do?"

"What’d I do?” Thaddeus put his arms up. “What’d I do?!” Dion regretting asking. Is this how Apollo feels most of the time?

“I did my good Christian duty of not inventing f-f-freaking weapons!" He said. "They wanted me to make a gas. Quicker killer than nerve gas, twice as terrible. Can you believe that? Weaponized gas! Geez. It was too brutal. Too. T-t-too brutal.”

“Who asked you to do that?”

“Some god awful woman. I think she called herself A-a-amelia. Real scary type, never laughed, never smiled. I don’t think she even had a pulse. Ice c-cold bitch.” He said. “I shoulda’ known someone like her had connections. Should! Have! Known!”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

He kicked a tire. Then he winced, grabbed his shins and hopped on one foot. "Damnit," He shouted. "Goddamnit,"

Thaddeus sat down on the seat of a broken down car, the leather had holes in them, a rat retreated back inside when he landed.

"Life's hard when you have principals. Sometimes it gets so hard you even wonder why you had them in the first place. It’s not like other people care. It’s not like other people are even half as fair. But you have anyways,” His shoulders slumped. “And you spend your time wondering, still. Till you die, probably.”

The pause was unsettling. Dion could not respond. He just let it pass, like a storm almost.

“Is this a bad time to ask for a new weapon?” He muttered.

“What?!” Thaddeus scream. “Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no.”

"Now hold on, let me tell you the situation, okay? This green-guy thing was jumping around like a grasshopper. He was armored up, throwing black…things! Like he was god damn Odin. Struck like thunder, really hard stuff."

"Then call the police! Ask Apollo, not me!”

"I have to kill him, and it has to be alone. That’s that." Dion slapped his thighs with some finality.

"K-k-kill him? Oh, geez. I didn't want to know that," Thaddeus stood up, put his palms to his ears and walked around the graveyard of cars. "I do not want to know what you do to these people,” He turned to wag his finger at Dion. “And they are people! Don’t forget that.”

“I don’t,” Dion stood. “Believe me. I know. But sometimes… you have to kill people.”

“Oh gosh. Oh, gosh. Oh, gosh,” Thaddeus shook. “I gave you those weapons with the belief that you’d kill demons. Monsters! Not people.”

"It’s a stretch to call them people, I learned that yesterday. I saw into their eyes, saw what little humanity was left in him. He’s not a person, that - thing - that nearly killed me."

"No, no, no,"

Dion walked over to him and put his hand on Thaddeus’ shoulder.

"You don’t need to know the details. But you said it yourself, you need to help me. And in doing so, I help you,"

Thaddeus looked around. The owner of the junkyard sat in a small room chewing bubble gum. He was listening to the radio, with his legs kicked up to a counter. Thaddeus looked the opposite side. A rear light fell down from one of the cars atop the mountain.

“Goddamnit,” Thaddeus said. “W-w-what do you need?”

"A new gun, I lost one of my pistols. Or...it was captured, I don't know." Dion said.

"You lost one of my - what? You know what that means right? Remember that story? Justiciar Léona. Remember what happened? The church will kill us!" He was in hysterics now, running around in circles. He could have made a hole in the floor had Dion not stopped him. “They’re gonna kill us. They’ll really chop our heads off this time. Don’t you care?"

“Just relax.”

“Don’t tell me to f-f-fucking relax!”

“Thaddeus,” Dion said. “Think about the short time for now. We’ll concern ourselves with the long-term later, alright?” He said. “I need firepower, right here, right now?”

He rubbed his temples.

“I can’t give you more explosive power,” He said. “But I can give you some…things I’m testing. It’s experimental -”

“Great!” Dion said.

“It’s dangerous.”

“That’s fine, I need dangerous,”

“It might melt your hand off, you hear me? I can not be held liable to your safety.”

“Well, we all have to take chances, huh?” Dion smiled and started out the junkyard.

4

“Wait, wait, wait,” Thaddeus said. “You’re still helping me.”

“With what?”

“Looking for an engine,”

“Alright, I can carry that out pretty easily.”

“No, you’ll be carrying all of it out.” Thaddeus pointed up, to the very tip of one of the mountains. A van stood there, half broken, half compressed. Only it’s front seemed operational. It must have been the length of ten fully grown men tall and looking at it, with how high it poked the sun, forced Dion to cup his hands.

“Can’t the other guy help you?”

Thaddeus pointed to that ‘other man.’ The owner, in his little chair in the small room with the radio and the foldable lawn chair. He was drunk asleep.

“Alright, alright,” Dion said. He walked past Taddeus and tested the footing to climb.

“Oh, and take a shower when you’re done, alright?” Thaddeus walked over to one of the shaded, rusted cars and sat. A bit worried, a bit humored. He tapped his leg like a metronome beat until it became a kind of hypnosis until even the sound of Dion busting and bending rusted steel went deaf to him. Then he fell into it, the trance of deep thinking.

What were they going to do?