Tabi ni Deyou - Chapter 1 - Part 2

Back pain woke the girl the next morning.

She opened her eyes, and found herself lying on the bare ground. Her body was contorted into the posture of a stereotypical murder victim. If someone were to draw a chalk line around her body, she would form a perfect corpse. Obviously, she hadn't been murdered, but had merely fallen from her makeshift bed. Seeing no need to panic, she stirred herself and sat up. The other bed was already empty. A few yards away, the boy was dueling with the Super Cub, wielding a spanner in one hand.

"...Quite the early bird, aren't you?"

"'Early to bed and late to rise' isn't a good thing, you know?"

The girl was, however, no longer groggy enough to ignore such an insolent remark. She let him off with a kick to his back for now.

Satisfied by seeing the boy fall over in pain, she tried to relax her sore back by taking yoga-like poses, twisting her hips left and right, and finally stretching her arms up as high as she could reach. She considered running through a whole set of calisthenics, but she cut her stretching short and finished with a deep breath on the grounds that doing them by herself would look pretty pathetic.

"But boy, did you get up early so you could fix the bike?"

"Well, yeah. Otherwise it would get too hot before I finish." The boy took off his work gloves, which were black with oil and carbon. "Anyway, as soon as I'm through with this, I will have done everything I can. If it still doesn't work, then we can't fix it with what we have on hand."

"Uwaa, so now it's make-or-break, huh." The girl smiled wryly and started to gather everything she needed to treat their water.

As all of the water they had remaining had been taken from an unsafe source, she prepared to sterilize it by boiling. Using their small gas stove to heat such a large amount of water would be wasteful, so instead she collected branches and dried grass for an open fire. After arranging them on a brick, she lit the kindling using the boy's Zippo lighter.

It was already past seven in the morning and the sun was rising steadily. Before they knew it, the northern island's cool night air had been completely swept away and the hot summer sun beat down on them with the same intensity as it did in the other parts of the country.

While the girl labored at her torrid work, the boy continued his repair attempt.

The Super Cub's engine was actually rather simple. In fact, the boy had become quite good at disassembling its single-cylinder four-stroke engine.

He could, however, do little in the way of actual repairs beyond adjusting parts that had come out of alignment and tightening loose bolts. There wasn't enough space on the bike to carry spare parts in case something actually broke. If that was the source of their current problems, then they were in quite a bind indeed.

The bike had endured a lot of abuse from its previous owner; a broken part wasn't exactly unlikely. Bolts had come loose, rivets were damaged, the head gasket was developing a crack, and the oil was dirty. The tires and brake pads had become as smooth as a bald head, and the suspension was worn out. Unfortunately, they still needed the Super Cub to hold out for a good while longer.

"I wish I could get some replacement parts..." murmured the boy. Or if I could at least get my hands on some fresh oil, I could clean the parts we have. Though there wouldn't be any point in cleaning the parts if they would immediately become contaminated by the dirty oil in the engine.

"So, how does it look?" The boy was addressed from behind.

"Suboptimal."

"Uh-oh. Should I get ready for a walk?"

"Maybe? Well, we'll find out really soon." He gripped the handlebars, work gloves still on, and placed his foot on the starter pedal.

...Please, God, make this work, he prayed, and stomped on the starter pedal with all his might.

The engine turned over a few times, emitting a weak chugging sound. Even the girl, who had little experience with machines, could tell that it was a failure.

"..."

Not one to give up so quickly, he tried again. This time, he not only prayed to God, but also to the Super Cub itself.

"Aaaaand go!"

It made the same burdened chugging, but this time it stopped with a loud clank.

"...sigh."

It seemed that neither God nor the Super Cub felt like answering his prayer.

After giving up on repairing the bike, they started quickly packing.

Three months had passed since they started their journey, and with all that practice they had become accordingly efficient in their daily tasks. They poured the newly-disinfected water into two-liter bottles and stuffed a few useful-looking pieces of firewood in a special bag after breaking them into smaller pieces. Their camping equipment managed to wander back into the bundle, and they attached it to the silent Super Cub.

In the 30 minutes required they had already become soaked with sweat.

Though they were pretty far north, it was past nine and the summer sun was already broiling the land without mercy. If they could, they would have loved to ask the sun to lower its thermostat, but their voices would never be heard from 93 million miles away.

"Are we going to throw Cubby away after all?" Holding a helmet in one hand, the girl tapped her other hand on the saddle of their silver Super Cub. The black synthetic leather had already become too hot to touch for long. "I wish we could get it fixed somehow. I mean, we finally got used to riding on it together.

"Well, you've got a point there. Neither of us has ever used any other vehicle before, so we might not be able to use another bike even if we found one." The Super Cub is generally considered to be ideal for new riders because it was designed to be simple to operate... "But if it doesn't work..."

"Then it's useless junk!"

The girl kicked the Super Cub.

That moment, as if to protest the abuse of his dear two-wheeler, the boy's stomach suddenly growled. The girl's stomach, too, started growling in response.

"..."

"What are you looking at?! I haven't had breakfast either, so of course I'm hungry!"

"Ah, I was just surprised at how loud your stomach can...Ah—ouchouchouch!!"

The girl pulled his earlobe, stopping his words in their tracks.

"I'll cut your rations for that comment!"

"What am I, a dog?!"

"If you're not, then use your calories to move your feet instead of talking!"

"...it hardly uses any energy to talk..."

The girl did not object, but merely murmured something while taking a can out from the bag attached to the rear wheel and sat down on the nearest bench.

"It's hardtack. You don't have any problems with this, right?"

"...but it's too bland."

"Oh my! Aren't you the spoiled brat?"

"You complain as much as I do."

"Shut up. I made sure to prepare something. Look." She placed something next to the hardtack — a jar of strawberry jam.

"Happy? This is the best we have. We don't have much in the way of fruit preserves like this, so you better not use it all up."

"Yes, Ma'am!"

With only a few ounces of spread, the dry and tasteless hardtack would blossom into a graceful dessert. When they opened the jar, a sour yet fruity fragrance wafted out and sharpened their hunger.

"Shall we eat then?"

They took out enough for one meal and ate breakfast before departing. Having replenished a little energy, the pair's steps seemed a lot lighter than they had the day before.