The Restoration Project

3.13 - Skillet

He brought his hands to his ears, hoping it would help. It didn't. The buzzing continued. A high pitched, shrill sound that made him want to stuff his ears with cotton balls.

"You hear that?" he asked. His blurred vision revealed two vague shapes in front of him. One was Charley because of the way she walked and the other was Righty because of the missing hand. Not that Skillet expected anyone else.

"Bout time big guy, glad to have you back," Righty said, turning around to study Skillet. "Was worried I'd have to carry you."

Skillet wasn't sure what Righty meant by that until his vision cleared and he failed to recognize where they were. They were walking through a subdivision of abandoned cookie-cutter houses. The sun was nearly on the horizon ahead of them, although he was pretty sure it was at least a quarter of the way up the last time he saw it.

Something fell on his shoulder. He looked up at the clouds rolling in behind them. It would rain, but hadn't started yet. He brought his hand up to his shoulder to inspect what had fallen and found a clump of his hair.

"Uhm, Charley?" he asked, holding the clump out to her like a child holding a broken toy up to his parent.

Charley looked at it and swatted it away. "I know," she said, and then checked the position of the sun as if reading a watch. "Over there." She pointed to the side of the road.

Skillet lumbered over and sat on the curb. He patted his head except, where he should have felt a soft cushion of hair, he felt only the occasional tuft. His heart beat quickened as panic built but, almost as soon as it did, the nanobots activated and slowed it to a regular pace. They felt like a hand in his chest, massaging his heart. Charley sat down beside him and unslung her bag, prepping a needle and a vial of liquid gold.

"You sure he should get another? Won't he be useless again?" Righty objected.

"We need to slow it down," Charley insisted.

"You sure you guys don't hear that?" Skillet asked. The buzzing didn't stop. It was coming from everywhere.

Charley sighed and finished prepping the needle, pulling Skillet's sleeve up to reveal the meat of his arm. As she brought the needle closer to his flesh, a flash of lightning lit up the sky to the East. Skillet flinched, flexing his arm and knocking the needle out of Charley's hands. She squealed in surprise it fell to the ground. Had he not been sitting on the curb it would have been fine, but there was a storm drain at his side and the needle fell through the cracks in the grate. He looked at the blackness between the rusted iron bars, where the needle should be, with a blank expression.

"Shit!" Charley said, and scrambled to reach for the needle but her fingers couldn't reach it.

"You have another, right?" Righty asked.

"No!" Charley said, still scrambling for it.

Skillet stared at the grate as if it might cough up his needle any second. That shouldn't have happened. The Liquid Gold was his. He reached down and yanked on the grate. It didn't budge.

"It's long gone," Righty said. "Probably halfway down the street by now."

"You don't know that," Charley said.

"You can't get to it," Righty insisted.

Charley tried pulling with Skillet, but they couldn't even make the grate budge. It was stuck. After one final effort, Charley let out an exasperated sigh and sat back on the curb. "We're heading into a town, it'll have a pharmacy. We'll get a new needle there."

"Then we should go. We'll need a place for the night anyway," Righty pointed out.

Skillet nodded. He would have been fine just lying by the grate and taking a little nap. When Charley rose, he tried to stand up but couldn't.