Pappa Zulu – Chapter 21

“Recovery begins from the darkest moment.” 

-John Major

“Focus on the thumb. Try recoiling it.”

Dezba closed his eyes and tried his best to visualize the thumb moving. But one look at the mechanical appendage told him it wasn’t working. He gritted his teeth and tried focusing on it now, staring hard and willing it to move.

Before long, he noticed the cramp forming in his jaw and the layer of sweat that was forming again. It was staring at a brick wall and ordering it to move. No matter how hard he tried, which angle he looked at it from, the damn thing wouldn’t budge.

He gave up with a loud grunt. Andrews quickly rushed to his side and placed his hands on his shoulder.

“It’s alright. It will come in time.”

Dezba scoffed and looked at him angrily. “I thought you said this thing was adjusted!”

“It was, but it’s more complicated than that,” he replied. He placed his hands together, prayer fashion, and tried to explain. “It’s more of you adapting to it. You need to think of it as a part of you, pretend it is the hand you were born with. People who get the unit think that they have to force it to work for them when in fact, they need to stop thinking and just do it.”

Dezba wiped his head with his right hand. Between the effort of “forcing” this thing to work and the pain of last night’s buzz wearing off, he was had little patience for the metaphysical shit. Still, he gave it a try. Closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, he stopped trying to make it happen and just waited for it to do it on its own. He waited for what seemed like several minutes and then opened his eyes.

Still nothing.

“Doc…” he said, heavily. “I’m about ready to rip this thing off. What the hell good is it if it doesn’t even work? Just a real fucking expensive prosthesis is-”

“Make a fist,” Andrews said, completely ignoring him.

“What? Haven’t you been listening, I -”

“Make a fist!”

“I-” Dezba stopped short. The unit made a tiny whirring noise and he was almost afraid to look down. But he did, and saw the unit balled up into a fist. It released a second later, almost reflexively. He raised it to head level and eyed it ominously. And then it happened again. A balled up fist, with each mechanical knuckle joint revealed. It let go again and he saw all the tiny gears rotating inside them.

“Holy shit…” he breathed.

“See?” Andrews said, spreading his arms wide. “It’s just like working a real limb. You can try ordering it to move, but the damn thing won’t budge unless you make the nerves fire. And the key to that is to just…”

“Do it,” Dezba said with a nod. He could see the point the doc was trying to make. Too bad he had worked up such a good mad beforehand. Letting it go to now seemed like such a waste.

He tried closing it a few times more, and noticed that it only engaged part of the time. And the more he tried, the less he seemed to succeed. He stopped after a moment and took a deep breath, noticed Andrews looking at him and preempted him before he could say it.

“I know, give it time, right?”

“Exactly,” Andrews said with a nod. “You’ll get the hang of it eventually. It’s just a matter of learning how to do it without consciously thinking about it.”

Dezba sighed. “Not easily done, doc. I kissed the privilege of using my left hand goodbye when I sliced it off.”

“Yes, well… think of this as a second chance. All that phantom sensation, all that pain. It will finally be going to good use.”

A thought occurred just then. He put his hands together and poised like he was making a two-hand grip. “Doc… I wonder if you’d like to accompany me somewhere.”

Andrews crossed his arms and smiled. “Where are we going?”

*                    *                     *

The first crack was the loudest. All others reverberated and seemed to cancel out a little bit of the initial noise. The only other sound was the din of shattering glass which followed in the wake of every shot. So far, he was three for three, and Andrews was looking most disheveled.

Dezba smiled. It looked like he was batting one-hundred today.

“What’s the matter?” he yelled. “Never fired a weapon before?”

Andrews unplugged his ears. “I’m more on the recovery end of things. You know, rehabilitating people after they’ve been shot.”

Dezba reloaded and holstered the gun while he went to set up another row of bottles. There was no shortage of them at this point in the backyard, and he was happy to turn them into sharps. Since the city recycling depot had shut down, there was really nothing to do except let them accumulate.

He stepped back to the firing line and took aim. His left hand cupped his right hand satisfactorily again. The doc was right. Just a matter of not thinking, to go on instinct. And nothing brought out Dezba’s instinctive side better than the shooting range.

Andrews fingers went back to his ears. Dezba let loose with another volley. Five bottles shattered in quick succession. He managed to plug the first three a second time before some of the larger pieces hit the ground.

He lowered the gun and let out the breath he had been holding in. Smoke rose from the heated barrel and infiltrated his nostrils. All kinds of tension began to melt away and he felt the onrush of something he hadn’t felt in a long time. It was subtle and underpowered compared to what he remembered, but welcome nonetheless. 

He looked over to see Andrews smiling awkwardly.

“Are we done now?” he asked.

Dezba shrugged. “Well, field test seems to be . But…” he gestured to the pile of empties.

“Ah yes,” Andrews replied, looking somewhat impressed. “How long did it take you to accumulate all those?”

Dezba tried to reckon the total amount of time he’d been off the wagon. It was hard to tell, as much of the recounting was hazy and unreliable. Only one figure seemed to stick out in it all, and it seemed startlingly relevant.

“Grizzly cut me off a few weeks back, said I was in danger of drinking the town dry. His exact words were that we’ve only got so much of the pre-war stuff left, and if I didn’t want to start drinking his moonshine, I had to dry out for awhile.”

That made Andrews laugh. He wasn’t sure what the doctors poison of choice was, or if he even had one. But the land was full of stories of people who had been deprived of their favorite stock since the First Wave came, and how they were coping. Local production and trade seemed to be the method of choice. Even more interesting was the reviews that were coming in…

“Aint no way I’m drinking pig shit and turpentine,” he said. Andrews didn’t get it, and quickly changed subjects back to his new arm.

“Well, at least the arm is working for you. Guess it was just a matter of finding the right proving grounds.”

“Yeah…” Dezba then rushed over to the pile of empties by his back door. “Just one more round,” he insisted. Andrews waved a hand indifferently and took a look around, examining the muddy yard while Dezba set up.

“So you’re back in your old haunts, huh?”

Dezba nodded. He was wondering when they would get around to that subject. He moved back to the firing line and got into shooting posture. One handed this time, he decided. Straight up and out.

“No more chicken roosts I see,”

Dezba fired the shot and caught the bottle at the lower right side. The top fell down like a skyscraper that had just lost its foundation. Not a clean kill by any means. He lowered the weapon and drew in a breath of the cold, wet air.

“No, I, uh… got rid of them.”

“I suppose that makes sense.”

Dezba waited until he was sure Andrews had nothing more to say. He raised the weapon again and fired for the second bottle.

Dead center, shattered in all directions and even knocked the adjacent one sideways. He smiled grimly and lowered the gun to his side again, picking out target number three.

“Have you been to the basement?”

A shot rang out, and nothing happened. On the target line, three bottles remained. He looked back in Andrews direction and, in spite of the morning weather, felt his face turn hot.

“No…” he said. Andrews hummed thoughtfully.

“Do you think maybe you should?”

Dezba was about to take the shot before Andrews asked that. He felt a sudden wave of hesitation, lowered the gun and noticed his hand was trembling. Why the hell was he asking him this? What kind of answer could he give?

Dezba didn’t reply and looked back at his targets. Five fresh ones, waiting to get smashed. He raised the gun and took a fresh shot. The bottle rattled and righted itself, but didn’t shatter. He fired again, and again.

He closed in on them and shot wild. Two of the bottles exploded, criss-crossing bullets slicing across them and hitting them at odd junctures.

The gun clicked several times. The magazine was empty and the chamber open. But one bottle still remained.

He could hear himself breathing heavily. His heart was also pounding. He took one more look at Andrews, still looking on impassively. He whipped the gun at the bottle and knocked it off its stand.

“Sergeant…” Andrews spread his hands and began to approach him. Dezba raised a finger and pointed to the gate.

“Get out,” he said quietly.

Andrews stopped short and didn’t argue. He knew the look well enough, and turned to leave.