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Chapter 18
Driftwood
After eating breakfast at a local cafe—which Free had to be wrangled away from, lest he use up the remaining budget on cheap delights—the trio was ready to take on their task for the day. Frost and Free in high spirits as the weather blessed them with eighty degrees instead of a hundred.
Apparently, Lilipass’ local woodworker, Cornel, needed some help moving the last of the festival game stands over to the plaza. Hard work, sure, but a lot simpler than yesterday’s affair.
“How is the radio?” Frost asked Free while they walked.
“Good, for the most part, probably gonna mess with it a bit more—but the signal pulse should be fully powered in a day or three,” Free said. “By the way, how did that trip to Old Lilipass go? Didn’t get the chance to ask when you guys got back with Melli breaking my back.”
“Nothing of note,” Frost said.
“I met a nice lady and her child,” Foxx said.
“You're saying people still live at that dump?”
“That is one way of putting it,” Frost said.
Shortly after, they made it to Cornel’s workshop, a pavilion with a shack at the back. Workbenches cluttered the floorspace and tools were stored precariously in cabinets and hanging off clothes lines.
However, its owner was nowhere to be seen.
“Yo, Cornel, we’re here to help move stuff!” Free shouted, as if it would summon the man in question—it didn’t. “We’re not early or something, are we?” Free asked Frost.
“Nope,” Frost answered.
Free kicked up some sand, “Well, it's not like we can get this stuff moved without knowing where to put it.”
“Then we wait.”
Free leaned against one of the pavilion’s beams, “Good idea, I need to process all I ate anyway.”
The trio waited twenty or so minutes, keeping themselves busy like they usually did, but still Cornel was a no-show.
Frost was willing to wait longer—but Free wasn’t, “Alright, I’m gonna see if there’s a placement plan or something around.”
“We should sit and wait,” Frost said.
“I’m not gonna break something by just looking at it.”
Free looked around but there wasn’t much else to find other than more tools, wood scraps, and a few blueprints. So, he went over to the shed to see if there was anything there.
It looked nice for what Free thought was just a big work shed, its sand-orange paint job looked fresh, potted plants were neatly arranged around it, and its front door had a welcome mat shaped like a chubby buck-toothed fish.
“Do not, it is rude to poke around,” Frost glared at Free.
“And it's rude to leave your help hanging—I’m going in,” The shed’s double door didn’t have a lock, so Free opened it with ease.
The front of the inside was filled with various constructions, mostly it was just the twenty game stands they were meant to move—but at the back was something strange, a zipper hammock hanging high off the ground. Along with that, there was a fridge, a drafting desk, and an industrial fan blowing at full power.
With what he was looking for nowhere to be found near the front, he stepped deeper into the shed, hearing deep and choppy snoring coming from the hammock.
Free put quickly two and two together, “Hey, we’re here to move the stands, mind telling us where?”
Snore-mimimi.
“Wake up, the day’s not gonna get longer,” Free said a little louder.
Snore-snort-mimimi.
Free snapped his fingers and raised his voice high, “Rise and shine!”
“
Huh-buh?!
” After a few moments of fiddling around with the zipper, Cornel opened the hammock and peered through the gap in the zipper, he had deep raccoon-like dark circles under his eyes. “Hey dude, how's it hangin’?”
“Hanging fine—but I’d like to start getting all these stands moved,” Free said.
Cornel gave Free a sleepy and confused look before fully processing what he said, “Oh yeah, yeah, dude, we’ll start in a sec. Just let me do my morning stretches, and I’ll be ready to go.”
Cornel crawled out like a newborn slug, slumping down belly-first onto the ground.
He was a big pear-shaped fellow with a short leaf-coat, his head just a few inches short of hitting the ceiling. His choice of clothes were baggy board shorts and worker’s gloves.
“What’s your name again, dude?” Cornel stretched.
“Name’s Free, the Self-made Machine,” Free answered.
“Rad title, dude, love the energy.”
“Thanks, man.”
“Feel free to grab a drink or something, gotta stay hydrated. Dehydration is serious… Wait, do machines get dehydrated?”
Free grabbed the most vibrant-looking soda out of the fridge, “Some do, some don’t.”
“Woah dude, that’s like, insane, so many different varieties,” Cornel finished stretching and let out a big yawn. “Seven all nighters really does a number, dude, but like, let’s get this party started so the real one can begin, you feel me?”
Cornel stumbled out of the shed and over to his workshop, Free following behind and lightly guiding him so he didn’t fall over or trip.
Foxx and Frost greeted him, but Cornel didn’t notice either until they were right in front of him, “Sal went all out, three sets of hands…” Cornel noticed Foxx didn’t have any “...Two sets of hands…”
Cornel looked at Foxx, “Little dude—show me what you can do, little dude.”
Foxx was unsure of what that exactly meant, but in response he picked up a scrap of wood and then placed it back down.
“Woah, cool magic little dude… Wait, hold on, I have some rad tricks too,” out of his pocket Cornel fished out a miniature surfboard with wheels on its bottom.
He placed two fingers on it, like they were legs, and tried to emulate surf tricks, using a workbench like a wave.
Tried
T to emulate surf tricks—he failed each one, eventually giving up after the last one he did knocked the board into his nose.
“Not as cool, but still gnarly…” Cornel scratched his belly as he put the miniature surfboard back into his pocket then took out a stapled together list. “I got the plan here, we just gotta follow it.” He squinted his eyes to read it, “One out of twenty, first on the menu, ‘Fisher’s Barrel to placement thirteen.’”
Over the next few hours, they went down the list, using three small carts bound together to make a bigger cart—a reliable and helpful vessel kept together by hopes, dreams, and layers of duct tape—which move each stand quickly and relatively safely.
Although, even working nonstop, they found themselves a bit behind schedule as Cornel wasn’t much help.
Not out of lack of trying, but it seemed that his body had reached its brink long before they met him. The moment he went to help lift a stand—he took a seat on the floor and immediately passed out.
Frost tried to pick up the slack and bring them back up to pace, carrying stands on their own while the other two used the cart—only for Frost to join with Cornel, Free forcing them to rest in the shade after nearly blowing another coolant pipe.
Even with only Foxx and Free remaining, by around the early evening they were almost done—if they kept at it, Free figured they’d be done in an hour or two. However, Free also figured that they deserved a much-needed break.
Free planted himself on a plastic lawn chair next to the Cornel’s pavilion, facing away from it, and Foxx found a spot in the sun.
“How many left?” Free huffed.
Cornel woke up, but only for a moment, to answer, “Just four more, dude, just four more,” he went back to sleep.
Foxx tilted his head, “But there are only three?”
Cornel woke up again, but didn't open his eyes, “Naw, little dude, that’s just the heat getting to you—
snore-mimimi.
”
Free took a glance behind himself to double check… and Foxx was right.
“Eh?” Free jumped up and fully turned around, “Foxx’s right, there’s only three left!”
Cornel opened his eyes slightly and brought the list right up to his nose, “Naw, I made twenty-one, says here and…” he slowly tapped his head, then went back to sleep.
“Frost, you don’t see them either right?” Free said.
“Nope,” Frost answered.
“Naw… heat stroke got you too?” Cornel snored.
“Why don’t you look with your own eyes then?” Free said.
“Oh yeah… good idea, dude,” Conrel flopped onto the floor instead of turning his head, opening one eye, “Oh… Where could of those big guys go? Think they like, evolved or something? Grew little flippers and just… ran away? So sad seeing them grow up—”
Cornel fell asleep—a much deeper sleep this time.
Free went back to lounging in his chair, “Should we go find it? I mean, it wasn’t in the job description.”
“We should,” Frost stood up.
“Fine,” Free sighed.
There was not much to be found at the pavilion when it came to clues, so they looked around the shed.
Free quickly jumped up onto the roof to get a sky view, Frost looked for tracks and other things left behind, and Foxx sniffed around and wiggled his ears—and he was the first to find something.
Foxx presented an unlocked padlock to Frost.
Frost couched down, “Where did you find it?”
Foxx pointed to the potted plants.
“May I have a closer look?” Frost opened their hand; Foxx placed the padlock in it.
The padlock was mostly clean, save for the layer of dry sand that covered the bottom of it. Its bar wasn’t bent but it had scratches around its keyhole, meaning it was most likely opened by finesse rather than force.
“The break-in was recent, most likely last night,” Frost concluded.
Leaving Foxx and Free to check the outside for more clues, Frost went inside the shed.
They expected there to be scratch marks, but they found none—instead finding that the floor beneath where the stand stood was partially wet.
Frost couldn’t conclude how the culprit moved the stand without leaving any scratches and nothing more was to be found in the shed beyond the wet floor—so Frost went back outside to check on the others.
“Found something,” Free sat down on the edge of the roof and looked down at Frost, “look down.”
Although hesitant and skeptical at first, Frost looked down—there were two lines in the sand that led into wild shrubbery, which Frost now noticed to be disturbed—some shrubs trampled, and leaves pushed back.
From a ground view the lines in the sand were practically invisible, too faint and shallow to see unless one was looking for it.
“They don’t look like tracks, unless it was a slug or something,” Free noted.
“They used dragging branches to cover their tracks,” Frost corrected.
Free hopped down, “Covering their tracks is an overstatement—honestly, it made them easier to follow.”
“It was effective enough that you did not notice it earlier.”
“True.” Free turned to Foxx, “Found anything else yet?”
Foxx shook his head then regrouped with the other two.
Free looked at the sky to tell the time and sighed, “We don’t have much time left—let’s just follow the trail and get this over with. The priority is getting the stand back, yeah?”
“Agreed,” Frost said.
With that, the tiro followed the lines, passing through the dense shrubbery which shortly cleared into a sand path, the lines continuing down it. After some more walking, they found themselves at a small beach hidden between two short cliff sides—the lines ending right where the tide hit the sand.
Along the center of the beach were shore rocks both short and tall, and near them were three chairs around a wooden table shaded by a wide umbrella—a vibrant, colorful umbrella, like the ones back at Reef Coal.
“Seems like they swam away and took the stand with them,” Free said, staying several feet away from the tideline.
Frost pondered, “From what we know.”
“Welp,” Free lounged onto one of the chairs, “I’m not gonna be much of help, so I'll let you handle it—just don’t strain anything.”
Frost, very slowly, walked up to Free.
“What?”
Frost smirked.
“You know I can’t swim—”
“Nor can I,” Frost replied.
“Alright then, lets head back,” Free stood up—
Frost grabbed him and threw him up into the air like a javelin, “But you can fly.”
Free wasn’t thrown that high off the ground to necessitate flight, but still reflexively conjured his wings and batted them—flinging himself up high.
Before Free could curse out Frost, he stopped himself—and not just because Foxx was in ear shot.
He slowly lowered down to only a few feet above the water, he had noticed something, then shortly after giving whatever it was a quick look, he returned to the beach and perched himself on the tallest of the shore rocks.
“
Hilarious,
” Free said with light-hearted anger.
“Thank you,” Frost replied.
Free sighed, “I did see something—there’s a glow under the lower shoreface, right where it gets steep.”
“What color was it?” Frost asked.
“Why is that important?” Free stopped perching, now sitting normally with his legs dangling, “Never mind, doesn't matter—it was an amber-ish glow, like fire.” Free kicked his legs up and onto a shorter shore rock, “Don’t know how you’re gonna get to it, seems like we’ve gone as far as we can by ourselves.”
“Hmm,” Frost turned around and started walking into the ocean, tightening their jacket’s drawstring.
“Frost,
you can’t swim.
”
“I am aware.”
“Then what—”
Frost walked further down into the ocean, but they didn’t float up—not even their fluffy insulation jacket. Instead, they sank, walking across the beach floor as if they were on land.
Free sighed, “Should’ve guessed.”
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