Chapter 7

 One Forty Two turned around to examine the field. It was mostly nothing but those dead looking grass patches, but some parts of it were bare.

“Hey,” the woman shouted in his direction. She was back outside with the little boy standing right next to her. “Don’t f*****g try anything. I’ll be watching you.”

One Forty Two nodded silently and watched as the mother patted her son on his back and encouraged him to walk towards One Forty Two. The boy walked unreleuctently towards One Forty Two with a smile on his face.

“Hi!”

One Forty Two tooked in a sharp breath with surprised, but let it out with a disgruntled breath and nodded at the kid.

“Here, I’ll show you what we gotta do.” The kid marched in front of One Forty Two and made his way to a bare portion of the field. One Forty Two watched for a second before making his way to the boy

When they got where they needed to be the picked up a child sized sword like object.

“Duel purpose,” the boy said as he held it up for One Forty Two to see with a grin. The boy swung it through the air, and One Forty Two flinched, nearly getting into defensive mode before realizing who he was dealing with again. The boy didn’t realize his reaction, but stab the sword into the earth and began plowing the field, continuing work that seemed to have been done earlier.

“I can’t fight if I have to, and plow fields.” The boy said when he got to the edge of the field fifteen feet from One Forty Two. “That row was already almost done cus I was working on it earlier till my mom made me water the plants. We’ll have to make the rest of them from all the way at the beginning.” The boy pointed to the end of the field where it stopped near the house, about thirty feet from where he was standing.

“Don’t a need a tool?” One Forty Two said quietly when the boy returned to him.

“What about that?” The boy said, pointing to the visible dagger on One Forty Two’s left arm.

One Forty Two lifted his arm to look at what the boy was talking about and then looked back at him. “It’s too short.”

“Can’t you take it out and hold it in your hand?”

In less than a second, the dagger shot out of it’s retracted place, and into weapon mode near his hand.

“Woah…” the kid said with his eyes wide open.

“Hey! What’re you doing over there?” His mother yelled from the porch.

One Forty Two turned his attention to the woman without a word and glanced back and forth from her to his arm.

“It’s ok ma! He just needed something to plow with!”

She sat back down on the chair on the porch with her arms crossed and her faced twisted into a frustrated look, making a shooing motion with her hands when she noticed One Forty Two was still looking at her.

One Forty Two turned back around to look at the boy. “It’s still pretty short. It’s just a long dagger, not a sword.”

The boy shrugged. “I gues you’ll have to crouch down. Come on.” He motioned for One Forty Two to follow him and the two walked back to the end of the field nearthe gate.

“You start right here,” the boy said, pointing to the place where One Forty Two would plow his straight line. “And I’ll go right here.” He pointed to the place next to One Forty Two, equidistant from One Forty Two’s spot as One Forty Two’s was to the other plow the boy was working on.

The boy dug his sword into the ground and began walking, and One Forty Two followed suit, courching down to reach the earth and crawling as he went along.

“So…” The boy said with a smile as they worked. “What’s up with your cool eye?”

One Forty Two looked up slightly and sighed. “I just want to work, eat and leave, kid.”

He continued crawling in the dirt, speeding up to get ahead of the kid.

“What about your arm? Why’s only one of them like that?”

“Because I didn’t want both of my arms cut off,” One Forty Two snapped at the child. He looked up the kid with a jolt as he said the words and held is glare for some time. The two stood motionless for a few seconds, and then One Forty Two put his head back down and continued working.

The boy frowned and continued working alongside him. “Do you not like talking about your robot parts?” He asked in a confused voice.

“I don’t care about them.”

“They’re really cool.”

“I’m sure they are.”

“Can you shoot lasers out of your eye?”

“No.”

“Can your arm shoot lasers?”

“Kinda.”

“Can you see in the dark?”

“Yeah.”

The kid smiled all the way through the interrogation. “That’s really cool,” he said.

One Forty Two stoped again. “Can we just work, please? That’s all I want.”

The boy frowned and stopped with him. “Why don’t you like talking about your robot parts?”

“I already told you, I don’t care about them.”

One Forty Two went back to working, faster this time. They were almost back to the house.

“Why don’t you like talking then?” the boy asked as they continued.

They got to the house before One Forty Two could answer and One Forty Two stood up and brushed the dirt of his pants.

“Because I just want to work.” He said as the kid stood up.

“But talking makes working funner.”

“I don’t want work to be fun, I want it to be fast. Now what do we do next?”

“If we have fun it’ll seem faster.” The kid persisted.

“What’s next?”

The boy sighed and pointed at the ground. “There, the same distance that the other two were apart. We gotta make rows to the end of the house, so, four more? Including the ones we just did. I think that should do it.”

One Forty Two got back down on the ground and stabbed his dagger into the dirt. “Let’s go then kid.”

The boy frowned and walked to his spot. “My names not ‘kid’ you know.” He said as he dug the sword into the ground and began wlaking.”

“Ok?”

“It’s Timmy.”

“Alight, Timmy.” One Forty Two continued working, staring at the ground as he dug into it, but Timmy stared at him, trying to read his empty face in the best way a ten year old could.

“What’s your name?”

“Didn’t you hear it while you were peeping out the door?”

“I was too busy looking at the robot.” The boy said with a smile. “I’ve learned how to drown out other peoples voices, thank to my parents.” The boy gave a short giggle, then looked to One Forty Two for a similar response.

“Wish I could do that.” One Forty Two mumbled under his breath.

“Why can’t you?”

“I don’t have a name,” One Forty Two said with a huff. “And because.”

“I did hear that you’re from the Mountains. What’s it like there?”

“Can we please work kid?”

The boy gave a grumpy humph and continued working. They made it back to the end of the field andbegan working their way back to the hous

“When we’re done working can we talk?” the boy said when they were almost halway there.

One Forty Two stayed silent and continued working.

“Hello?”

“Sure.” One Forty Two finally said reluctantly.

“Yes!” the boy whishpered excitedly under his breath. He worked faster than befre, rushing to finish so he could get on with his interview.

The two finally finished near the house a little while later. One Forty Two retracted his dagger and the boy dropped his sword and grabbed at One Forty Two’s mechanical arm.

“Hey!” One Forty Two shouted in protest. He pulled his arm away and took a step back from the boy. He didn’t know why, but the kid touching his arm made him immensely uncomfortable.

“Sorry.” The boy said in a somewhat confused and irritated voice. “I thought you didn’t care about your robot parts.” He mocked.

“I don’t.” One Forty Two said as he began to calm down. “Sorry, just, I don’t know, I don’t know why I did that.”

He grabbed the boys hand with his robotic arm and led him back to the porch, much to the kids surprise and joy.

“How hard can you squeeze with your hand?” He asked as they reached the porch.

“Very.”

“Could you break my hand?”

“Yeah.”

The boy’s mother looked down at the two from the porch. “Timmy, go get more water for the plants. And you, there’s a well out thata way,” she point off to the North- west, behind the house and to the left of One Forty Two. “Go get somemore water from it, if there is any. Then you can help him with the plants.”

“But ma!” the boy whined, tugging on One Forty Two’s arm as he did. One Forty Two closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

“Then you can go play Timmy. But you’ll have more work.” She pointed at One Forty Two, shaking her finger at him. “If we’re going to be giving away supplies in this go forbidden desert you can be damn sure you’re going to be giving back plenty.”

One Forty Two nodded and began to walk in the direction of the well.

“Wait,” the boy said, still clinging to his arm. “I thought we were going to talk?”

One Forty Two sighed and squatted down to the kids level. “Look, how about this. Don’t talk. Don’t talk to me at all until you’re down working. Then, I’ll answer every question you have.”

The boys eyes opened wide at the prospect. “Really.”

One Forty Two stood up and nodded at the boy before continuing on towards the well.