Finding Phoenix

“Marco, we’ve been walking for hours, can’t we stop and take a break?”

“We’re in the middle of the desert, genius, we stop to take a break and we're dead,” he says, “besides, this place is probably crawling with screechers.”

“But I’m tired,” he groans. 

“Sammy, I swear to god if you don’t move your ass,” he says, leaving it open.

He frowns but catches up to him, leaning against his arm, “please?”

He looks down at him, the brown eyes widening as he juts out his bottom lip to pout. Marco rolls his eyes, “fine. We’ll stop for ten minutes and then we’re leaving.”

He pats his shoulder quickly, “look, look, I think I see something.”

Marco turns, squinting at the spot in the distance before smiling, “looks like a junkyard! We should check if they have anything useful”

When they arrive there are cars piled upon cars that feel as though they’re radiating with heat from being in the sun all day. There’s plenty of metal lying around and Sam goes over looking at all of them, “they’re all pretty crushed, but there might be one that works.”

“Sam,” he says, getting his attention, “let’s check for keys.”

He nods and goes over to the door, opening it. The first thing they hear is the sound of crying and it causes Marco to reach for the blade on his back. It’s a loud and squawky sound that has him to grab Sam’s forearm and pull him behind himself, “stay behind me.”

Sam laughs, “I can handle myself you know?”

“Stay behind me,” he says again, only this time it sounds more commanding.

Sam reaches up to touch the hand on his arm, “I’m right behind you.”

His hand slowly falls from his arm and he draws the sword from behind him and walks forward, head turning from side to side until they get to the room where the noise is coming from. He pushes the door open with his foot before seeing the gangly gray creature standing above the half-eaten corpse. Behind it they see a baby sitting in a car seat, red in the face and crying as Marco steps forward. They watch it feed and Marco creeps closer, whistling. It turns, mouth and teeth covered in blood as it looks at them with empty holes in its face. The screecher’s loud as he swings the sword, cutting through its head and killing it instantly. The creature’s body drops and he turns to Sam but hears another screech from the ceiling as it jumps onto him, knocking him down. Before it can use its teeth to tear into him there’s a crowbar hitting it in the head. It turns towards Sam but Marco drives the end of the blade through its head.

When it falls Marco stands up and Sam rushes over, “are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Good job on finding the crowbar,” he smiles, putting his hand in his hair, ruffling it as he continues to search the room.

When the baby stops crying Marco turns to see Sam holding the child and smiling at it as he rocks them carefully and shushes them, “it’s okay, baby. You’re okay now.”

“Whoa,” Marco says, “put that thing down, we’re not taking it with us.”

Sam turns, looking dejected, “it’s a baby. We have to take them.”

“No we don’t, we’re not their parents, we don’t have to take care of it, it’s not our responsibility.”

“They’ll die if we don’t take them.”

“Yeah, it’s called survival of the fittest. Look at me, I’m ripped, that baby? Bet it can’t even do a push up. It’s weak,” he says, turning away, “and not our problem.”

“Marco,” he says, tone changing to a more serious one.

Marco sighs, knowing that voice. He turns, seeing the smaller man frowning, “we’re taking them.”

He looks at the baby before looking back to him and smiling, “Sam, I love you. I really do, and you know, you being all caring and compassionate is a part of why I love you. It really is. But we’re not taking them so just put it back, okay? Let’s find some stuff, get a car and we’ll leave.”

He uses the fabric of the desk chair he sees to wipe his blade clean of the black sludge and he hears Sam behind him, “I’m not going anywhere without this baby.”

He turns to look at him once more before sighing loudly, “god, okay, fine. Fine, you win, we’ll take the shit machine but I’m not changing any diapers and you have to deal with it if it cries.”

He nods, turning to the baby and cooing at them as they smile. Marco rolls his eyes, “stay here. I’m gonna see if any of these cars’ll start.”

He nods and Marco leaves, searching through the cars until he spots one by the building, untouched by other items. He checked to see the tank was full and it started up immediately. He packs some things he finds into the trunk and heads inside opening the door to see Sam rubbing the baby’s back as they sleep soundly against him, whispering when he sees him, “I just changed her and got her to sleep.”

“I found a few things and got us a car,” he smiles, “let’s get out of here.”

He places the baby in the car seat before picking it up, “I found formula and a few diapers but we’ll probably need more clothes. Will you grab the baby bag?”

He picks it up, slinging it over his shoulder before he’s heading outside. Sam looks at the car frowning and Marco turns, “what?” 

“Is there one that’s safer for the baby?”

“Sammy, it’s a Firebird. A 1978 Firebird and she’s fucking beautiful, look at the bird on the hood. Come on, she’s practically untouched!” 

“1978,” he says, “that’s an old car.”

“It’s a junkyard, Sammy, nothing’s exactly safe in this place.” 

“What about that one,” he points. 

Marco’s eyes follow his finger to the minivan and his smile falls, “that one?”

“You have the key for it right?”

He frowns and looks back to the other car, “but I already put everything in the trunk.”

“There’s so much space in this one too, we could take more stuff. Probably could move these seats out and use it for our furniture at our place.”

“Sam,” he says, shoulders dropping.

“Aww, it’s got a little ‘baby on board' sticker on the back. We have to take this one.”

“Nooo,” he groans, “come on, we already got the dumb baby. I got stuff to trade in for it. I took care of the screechers. I handled everything. I am a warrior. I’m a treasure seeker. I am a hardcore, badass bounty hunter in these parts and everyone knows my name. I have a reputation, I cannot show up in this minivan. We are taking the Firebird and that’s final. We are not taking the minivan.”

After a stern look from Sam and twenty minutes of moving items around they take the minivan. Sam reaches, adjusting the knob for the air conditioning and smiling when cool air begins to blow out against their faces, “isn’t this nice, Co? It’s got air conditioning and once you work your magic on those back seats we’re going to have such a nice couch and more space in the back.”

He grips the wheel and reaches for his face rubbing his eyes before focusing on the dirt path in front of them. Sam touches his shoulder, “Co, are you crying?”

“No,” he says, wiping at his eyes, “no. Me? Crying over a car? That’s not—that’s stupid! Why would I do that? That’s insane.”

“Marco,” he says softly, “we can always come back and get it later.”

“You mean it?”

He nods and pats his shoulder. They arrive in town soon, and people stare and point, making Marco sink down as Sam speaks, “we should go into the market, we need more stuff for her.”

“What? Now?”

“The market’s open, she can’t eat the foods we can.”

“Why the fuck not? Beef jerky and meat will be good for her, help her teeth.”

“I’m sure it will, when she actually has teeth,” he nods, “but for now we’ll need to stick with liquids.”

He sighs, “but everyone saw us come into town. The baby will just ruin my reputation. They’ll call me soft and I’m not soft. I am hard. I’m so hard and-”

“Just go with me,” he sighs, “you can bring things to trade while I try to buy some food for our daughter.”

“Whoa! No. No, no, no. She’s not our daughter. Alright? She’s a baby. Not our baby. A baby.”

“Just grab your stuff.”

Marco puts on glasses and when Sam sees a stand with clothes he takes off his watch making Marco’s brows raise, “what are you doing?”

“Selling my watch. I’ll need a bed for her.”

“You’re not selling your dad’s watch, I’ll get her a bed. You just keep your clothes on. Take these and go trade them for money?”

He takes off a few rings from his fingers and puts it in his hand, “don’t take any less than five hundred for that gold one.”

He nods and holds out the baby to him. Marco stares at it, “what is—what are you doing?”

“Take the baby for a while.”

“What? You’re just gonna leave me with it?”

“Her,” he corrects, “and yes, just for a few minutes. Do you think you can handle that?”

“No, fuck no.”

“Marco.”

“Babe.”

“Take her.”

“Please don’t make me, people are staring.”

“Take her.”

He groans but eventually takes her in his arms as Sam leaves, “I’ll be right back.”

When Sam’s out of sight he looks down at the baby beginning to stir in his arms. When she looks up at him he holds his breath. The baby frowns and soon her face scrunches and she lets out a small hiccuping sound before crying.

“Oh no. Oh no. Sam! Sam! Oh my god, please stop crying,” he says. 

She cries louder and his face scrunches up as he holds her up and out away from himself, “Sam!”

People begin to stare and he groans, “what is it? What’s wrong? Are you sad? Scared? Hungry? Did you shit? If you fucking shit right now, baby, I swear to god.”

He takes a gold tooth from the pocket of his backpack, putting it in front of the woman as payment. He picks up a pair of glasses, putting it on the crying baby before putting a large cowboy hat atop her head, “there. Protected from the sun. You done crying now?”

She stops crying and he frowns, “why are you in a onesie anyway? Your parents put you in this, must be boiling.”

He takes the onesie off her and picks up a white cloth bag, “hey, lady, hold my baby.”

She looks annoyed but takes her and he quickly cuts holes into the bag before taking the hat off and slipping it on her. He puts the hat back on and he looks at her, “there. White dress, big hat and sunglasses. Better?”

She giggles and he nods, “great.”

As they walk around he finally finds Sam buying a small plush bed. He turns to see them and smiles before looking down at the baby, “what did you do?”

“She was getting hot in the sun so I bought her an outfit.”

“Of course you did,” he nods, “it’s great, very you.”

He nods and holds her out to him. He trades her for the small bed and tucks it under his arm as they walk. They come across a table with toys and stop. Sam turns, “should we get her toys?”

“Fine, but nothing annoying. No rattles or anything with bells.”

He nods, looking at everything. The baby reaches out to touch the rattles but Marco is quick to move them out of her reach before she can and replaces them with a stuffed animal. She picks it up before dropping it on the table. Sam hands her the rattle and she shakes it back and forth, giggling at the sound and giving Marco a headache. He rubs his temples while Sam looks at everything, Marco goes over to another table before picking up a stun gun and bringing it over, “you think that’s cool, baby? Check this out.”

He turns the stun gun on and the second she hears the small zapping noises she claps her hands together, laughing as she drops the rattle. He smiles, “yeah? You like it?”

She reaches for it and Sam turns her from it, “do not give her that.” 

“Relax, I’ll take the batteries out.”

He takes them out and flicks the switch on and off making sure nothing would happen before handing it to her. She puts one end in her mouth and Sam shakes his head, before looking at the toys, “we need to get her normal toys. I don’t want her to be a psycho or something.”

“I loved weapons as a kid.”

“You were ‘raised’ by horrible people.” 

“And I turned out fine!”

“You learned how to eviscerate someone before you learned how to read.”

“I still don’t really know how to read. But to be fair reading isn’t really that important anyway.”

“Yes it is. You almost died the other day when we went to the city to have a nice fancy dinner. Remember? You pointed at the picture of what you wanted instead of waiting for me to get back from the bathroom to order. Then you ate fish sticks thinking you ordered mozzarella sticks and you realized your mistake after the fifth stick when your throat started closing up. And then I had to trade our ride home for an epipen and an actual hospital visit so we had to walk all the way home.”

“Yeah, okay, I guess reading is useful sometimes.”

“Let’s see if they have any baby books around here for you to practice reading to her. Go check the other table.”

Marco goes to another table hearing the baby go back to playing with the rattle. He looks over his shoulder seeing Sam smile at her and the baby giggle and grin back up at him, reaching for the rattle he was teasing her with. He takes the taser from her and switches it with the rattle as he searches through the toys. Marco takes off his glasses putting them on the front of his shirt as his eyes scan the table. He finds a few books that have drawings of children and letters and assumes it’s what he’s looking for. He trades a few teeth and a belt buckle for them. He puts them in his backpack and grabs some sunglasses before turning back to Sam. A large man is standing in front of them looking angry and soon the rattling stops and the baby is crying. 

He’s pocketing the glasses and moving to stand by Sam’s side in a split second hearing him speak calmly to the larger man, “I’m sorry. I’ll just put the rattle to the side for now. Shh, baby, it’s okay.”

He rocks the baby in his arms but she cries harder. The man looks annoyed and speaks in a gruff voice, “if you don’t shut that thing up-”

“What are you going to do,” Marco asks, moving between the two men and scowling at him.

He gets closer to the other man's face, “what are you gonna do, big guy? Tell me. Tell me what you’re gonna do?”

“You need to quiet that baby down.”

The baby looks up at the stranger, crying louder and Marco feels defensive, “you’re scaring my daughter with your ugly mug.”

“Am I?”

“Yeah, you are, so I suggest you leave.”

“Co,” Sam says softer, “let’s go.”

Marco picks up the rattle and shakes it gently in front of her. The crying stops and she reaches out, taking the rattle and shaking it again. An unfamiliar hand touches his shoulder and soon the baby bed is out from under his arm. It hits the ground as he grabs the hand, turning and twisting it behind the strangers back. In seconds he’s pushing his knee into the back of the man’s, getting him to kneel facing away from him.

“Co,” Sam warns. 

“Don’t you ever put your hand on me,” he says.

“He’s not gonna make that mistake again, right,” Sam asks.

The man nods, “yeah, man, never again.”

“See, he said he wouldn’t”, he tells him, putting his hand on his shoulder, rubbing it gently, “let’s go home now, okay?”

He lets go of his hand and turns to Sam, “wipe that worried look off your face, will ya?”

He takes the glasses he’d bought and slips them on Sam’s face before putting his on and picking up the dropped bed, “he’s still breathing isn’t he?”

He nods, “yeah, but I’m not sure if he would be if I hadn’t been here.”

“I’m working on my anger.”

“You just dropped a man for touching your shoulder.”

“But I didn’t kill him,” he points out.

“True, baby steps I guess,” he sighs. 

“Speaking of baby,” he says, swapping the bed in his hands for the baby, “what should we name this one?”

“You wanna name her?”

“We can’t just keep calling her our daughter, gotta name her something.”

“Well, she’ll need a badass name if she’s going to be our daughter.”

He raises her up to the sky and she spreads her arms out wide, the light of the sun shining bright behind her as she shakes the rattle in her hand, “how about Phoenix?”

The baby shakes the rattle, giggling as Marco grins, “yeah? You like Phoenix?”

“It’s perfect,” Sam says as Marco lowers her down to eye level, “welcome to the family, Phoenix.”

Marco nods, “welcome to the family.”