I finally got to see the foggy street in the day again, and somehow I felt like I was starting to get used to the condition. As we walked further from the station, I could also still see the charred dead bodies lying everywhere on the road. Perhaps it was due to the fact that I had already seen the horrors in the night that made my mind no longer considered my current surroundings to be as terrifying as it was before.
I also noticed that somehow neither Kyle nor Ryan seemed to really mind the horrifying sights before their eyes. Instead, if anything they seemed to be considering as if there were no dead bodies on the street at all. When I thought about it, perhaps Captain Quentin had said something on their previous venture to the southern direction that made them have that much of courage, particularly before the aliens stormed the station.
When I came to, I noticed that the station could no longer be seen from behind us, and that we had just crossed the bridge to the familiar commercial center zone. It was the very same zone that Jonathan, Ryan, and I had ventured into, although indirectly since we were on the elevated railroad previously. I decided to break the silence by talking about it to Ryan, who seemed to be responding positively.
"It has been two days since the first time we got here, and somehow it felt different…" I said to Ryan.
"I cannot argue…" he replied, "Especially since we are now walking on the street, as opposed to walking on the railroad then…"
"Oh… you guys mean when you were going for the museum?" Kyle responded, somehow a bit enthusiastically.
With Kyle's response, I felt that I somehow could manage to turn the short moment of cold silence around us into a little warmer atmosphere. When I glanced a bit to Captain Quentin, he also seemed to be quite pleased with the change of atmosphere around us. The other good thing that I noticed was despite the fact that they seemed to welcome the change of the atmosphere, they also seemed to not putting their guard down even for a bit.
"I guess I should have insisted on going with the three of you huh…" Kyle continued, mumbling.
"Well look at the bright side, it did save you the disappointment of not finding any archery equipment there…" I responded to her, a little jokingly.
"Hey, I am not that useless without my bow and arrows, you know!" she responded, with a bit of a laugh, "Do not tell me you did not see me shoot that monster with the handgun bullseye …"
Her response made me recall the event back at the station almost instantly. Indeed, I was more or less surprised that she managed to take down the burning alien back then with her handgun. It was not a question of how she could take it down, but rather how she could be that accurate with the firearm. Then again, she could have had fired one before the invasion took place.
"But seriously though… you do have some experience in firing one before, have not you?" Captain Quentin asked, as if he was also thinking the same.
"Well, my late dad had one, similar to the one you currently have, Captain…" she answered.
"He used to invite me to shoot it for once in a while whenever I had my summer holiday back when I was in high school…" she continued.
"Ah… we are sorry about your dad…" Ryan replied, as soon as she finished her words.
With Kyle's revelation, I finally knew for sure that she had experiences in firing a .45 ACP handgun. For most cases, people who tend to use firearms with heavier cartridge would have not so much of a problem when firing the smaller ones. Noticing the fact, I realized that we could actually rely more on her.
"Wow, I bet that you did not feel as much as a knock for the handgun, as opposed to your old man's…" Captain Quentin continued.
"Yeah, this handgun is surprisingly lighter to fire…" she responded, as she patted the gun holstered on her waist belt.
I glanced at her handgun as she patted it. To the least of my expectation, it seemed that she also knew well regarding the handgun's safety, since her handgun was on safety mode. Either she had known it beforehand, or someone had told her about it, possibly either Ryan or Captain Quentin. Nevertheless, I still believe that it was quite remarkable for her to understand more about a firearm's mechanics other than just to point and shoot it.
As the warm conversation went on, I realized that we had almost gone out from the commercial center zone, and therefore we were nearing the old market district zone. I recalled that from where we were currently at, we would still have to go straight ahead and pass three intersections before turning left at the fourth one. I reminded the others about it, and fortunately the atmosphere did not turn tense as they acknowledged my reminding.
"So, how does it actually feel to be back at your old neighborhood?" Ryan asked her, before I also turned to her direction.
"Well, I cannot exactly say it would feel good, especially during this kind of moment, but…" she responded, somehow with a distant look on her eyes.
"Let us just say that it would bring me some nostalgic moments…" she continued, this time with a little smile instead.
Right after she said her words, I somehow also tried to recall whatever memories I had left about the town before I left for San Francisco twelve years ago. The only two things that I could remember was the big station where I departed from, and that I was rushing at that day to San Francisco for several reasons that I could not remember. I suppose that I would not be able to remember much about the things that had taken place more than ten years in the past after all.
"Okay, heads up… The third intersection just ahead of us…" Captain Quentin suddenly said.
As we crossed the intersection, I could feel as if we were sent back to the time of the past. Back when the three of us were on the elevated railroad, I could already feel the vintage atmosphere of the older part of the town. However, it was totally different when I finally got to walk in the middle of its very street.
It felt like as if I was venturing out in the middle of a long abandoned small city engulfed in endless fog with three other people. Despite feeling terrified or scared of the situation, I somehow felt lonely instead. The large, thick red bricks that made up most of the buildings in the zone fully succeeded in convincing my mind that they must have been built no later than in the early 1950s.
"Are you starting to feel nostalgic yet?" I asked Kyle, with a little of smile.
"Hmm… I am not sure yet… Somehow this part of the old market district does not feel familiar to me…" she responded, as she frowned a bit to our new surroundings.
As we took the left turn, the buildings around us were already completely showing a vintage style. So far as my eyes could see, the buildings around us were only five stories tall, or less. I could also see some chimneys on top of some of the buildings there, indicating that the people who used to work and/or live there were still using some form of a fireplace inside the buildings.
"Now, we are talking…" Kyle suddenly said, "I recognize some of the buildings here…"
"Does that mean the bike shop is around here?" Ryan asked her.
"Supposedly, yeah…" she responded, "Or it could be just across this street."
I immediately focused on my sights to look for any bike shop signs as according to Kyle we were already nearby. At first, I was a little worried that the bike shop would had already been destroyed since few of the buildings there were nothing anymore but piles of scattered bricks.
However, as I glanced to Kyle she did not seem to share the same thought like me since she just kept on glancing at each of the buildings we passed. I was starting to also think that perhaps the shop was on the other side of the street since another intersection had slowly emerged before my eyes, when she suddenly said that we have arrived in front of the shop.
"Phew, we are here…" she said to the rest of us.
'Cody Bike Shop' was shown on the sign of the building on our right side. As I glanced the building, it did looked like it was already established long ago in the past based on the red bricks that had made it up. Not only that, even the glass panel gave out some sort of an aura like it was made sometime in the 1940s. The only thing that did not seem antique at all, was the chain lock that closed the entrance door, as well as the board sign 'Open again on January 4th 2033'.
"Okay, I have to agree that this looked extremely antique…" Ryan said.
"Well… if you excuse me…" Captain Quentin said as he readied my fire ax he held on his right hand.
Captain Quentin swung the ax pretty hard right before it hit the chains. It took him four swings before the chains started to break. When they were finally cut loose, we opened the door without further waiting, and entering the building right away.
"Sorry to barge in like this, Cody…" Kyle said with a low voice.
As we entered the bike shop, I immediately noticed that it was not just an ordinary shop to buy bicycles. It might also in fact be a bicycle workshop, and a big one for that matter. It was the least of my expectation to see that the shop was bigger than it looked like from the outside, since it turned out that the shop also had a large back door, possibly functioning as the garage workshop door.
There were six bicycles on display at the shop on my left side, facing the window glass. To my right side, were the cycling clothes such as helmets, knee pads, and elbow pads. As I walked deeper and nearer to the garage door, various bicycle parts were on display. I recognized that chains, sprockets, brake discs, and even the pedal as well as its arms were among those items.
"Do you think we should just take those parts back instead of the whole bicycles instead?" I asked to the rest of the others.
"It would be more practical that way, yeah…" Ryan responded, "But, then again who knows if Virgil does need the whole bicycles…"
Ryan, Kyle, and I turned to Captain Quentin as we had stated our thoughts, waiting for him to say his point of view, or rather the final decision for us all. At first, he seemed to be in doubts on what he should decide. However, eventually he stated that it would be best for us to take the four bicycles and few numbers of each of the parts with us back to the station.
"I guess that it would be better for us to take the bicycles back to the station as well." he responded,
"Even if it later turns out that Virgil does not need the bicycles, we could at least use them as transports." he continued.
To be honest, I had not thought about it that far. Even though I was not sure that all of us could ride a bicycle, at least there were four of us that could. It would also definitely prove to be a more efficient method in going from one place to another by using a less noisy form of a vehicle. Therefore, I agreed with Captain Quentin's suggestion. Both Ryan and Kyle also did not seem to disagree as well.
We immediately packed up the bicycle parts as soon as we agreed on it. I was the one to pack five sprockets inside my backpack. As I was putting them inside, I glanced at the others to find out what they were inserting.
Ryan put five chains inside his backpack, while Kyle focused on pedals and their arms. I noticed that Captain Quentin also had taken some pedals with him, but he did not put them inside his backpack. Instead, he headed for the displayed bicycles and seemed to be doing something with the pedals near them. It did not take me long to realize that he was actually assembling the pedals to the displayed bicycles there.
When we were finally done, all of us approached the four bicycles that had their pedals installed by Captain Quentin. As we lead the bikes outside the shop, we mounted them and we started to ride back to the station. I looked at my watch, and realized that the time was then 09.28 a.m., hinting me that it looked like we could in fact arrive back quite some time before 10.00 a.m. like we had planned before...