The Bird With a Broken Wing (3)

꒰ঌ The Bird With a Broken Wing 3

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We waited until dawn before taking the first train. The skies looked as if it was about to rain — despite it being morning, the skies were still gray.

"Hey, you should be going to school, right?" Lucy asked while we were sitting in the wobbling train.

"Skipping it. Doesn't really matter if it's only for a day." Moreover, I've already skipped plenty of lessons due to all sorts of reasons, but I decided not to tell her about it.

"Did you leave a message for your mother?"

"No…"

"But…"

She herself is a runaway girl, but Lucy was surprisingly caring towards others.

"Look, you're the one who asked me to leave with you! Why are you still worried about things like that?"

"… I thought you did it on a whim yesterday, and that you would return today."

So she was actually looking down on me.

"You are the one who's really running away from home! Your father is probably looking all over for you right now, yeah? Moreover you're a repeat offender…"

Lucy shook her head. "There will be a performance tomorrow. That man should probably be heading down to the airport already."

"That can't be, right? We're talking about his daughter disappearing…"

"But for that man or the band, it'll be a much bigger problem if the conductor's missing, right?"

Well, she's not wrong, but… though it's not like we'll be found out that easily, but I guess it'll be much better if we're more careful when we're passing the police stations? Lucy is someone who had shot advertisements before, so there might be people who may recognize her in a single glance.

"Where are we going?"

"The district office."

"District office?"

We alighted at the station located in the middle of the city, then made our way towards the office streets by walking through the north entrance of the station. In response to my suggestion that lacked any serious consideration, the runaway-girl Lucy seemed pretty scared.

"What if they realized that we're running away from home…"

"It'll be fine if we walk in with our heads held high! They probably wouldn't even consider the possibility of two people running away from home entering the district office just like that, right?"

Then again, it's a little too abnormal for me to be carrying a guitar case and luggage, so I made Lucy take these two things and hide in the bathroom, while I walked into the environmental office by myself.

"Large rubbish? Ah, we do, there's a chart over there." The fat lady at the counter took her ballpoint pen and tapped at the waste classification chart before I finished my sentence.

"What I want to ask is, I don't really want to throw it away, but rather, where will I find the things that I accidentally threw away?" The lady tilted her head and looked at me. "Meaning I've thrown something away by mistake."

"What? You mean you want to find something? Impossible, absolutely impossible."

For a brief moment, I had a really strong impulse to just slap her on her head. After hounding the lady for quite a while, I finally got something about some environmental center. It's a treatment plant where they crush the large-sized rubbish into smaller pieces.

"But even if you go there… it's impossible, you definitely won't find it. Do you know just how much rubbish is sent there daily? Do you really think you'll find it after getting there?"

"Thanks."

I quickly ran out of the place. She actually asked me if I thought I would find it after getting there? I think I can, so how about that!?

The environmental center is located at the fringes on the other end of the city. I alighted at a station which I had never been to before, and it still took us another twenty minutes before we arrived at our destination, which is located on a small hill. When we finally saw the sheer size of the building amid the green forestry, both Lucy and I stopped in our tracks subconsciously.

Trucks filled with large trash rumbled past our sides. The two of us could only stand by the side of the road and watched on in amazement, as we narrowly avoided being crushed by those trucks.

"It's so huge…" Lucy mumbled, as if to voice out my feelings within.

Our school can be considered rather spacious, but this place is of another level altogether. The structure which we could see was already many times larger than our school, and it was constantly giving off loud sounds.

The words of the fat lady at the environmental office rang next to my ears again: "Impossible, absolutely impossible!"

"In any case… let's take a look first?"

"… Mmm."

We were almost runned over by an outgoing truck just as we reached the entrance. Lucy was coughing hard due to the dusts blown up by the truck. 'Environmental Center — Waste Crushing Plant' — that was what was written on the doorpost.

"Where should we go?"

Just as I was looking around us, Lucy quietly pointed towards the left. There was a sign that said 'Registration Lobby' and an arrow pointing to the left. At some distance to the direction of the arrow, one could see a small building similar to that of a petrol station.

As we got closer, we could see a large roof extending off that building. Beneath it was a metallic plate about the size of a car, and next to it was a machine that looked like a mailbox. A large 'STOP' was painted on the asphalt in white.

"This should be used to measure the weight of the trucks?" Lucy said.

I see, so they'll have to weigh themselves upon entering or exiting the place? If so, there should be people at the registration lobby, right?

"Do you think you can find your bass in such a huge junkyard? Perhaps it's already been crushed already, you know?"

"I won't know… if we don't check it out."

That sounded like I was trying to console myself.

Just as we walked to the 'STOP' right before the weighing area, the door of the registration lobby suddenly opened. We flinched in shock and stopped in our tracks.

"No no, I said no! Are you guys coming here to throw your junk? You can't!"

The mister walked towards us aggressively, causing the frightened Lucy to hide behind my back.

"We won't accept small-sized rubbish here… eh? Hmm?"

The mister suddenly walked right up to me.

"Isn't this a guitar? You can't throw that guitar away!"

"Eh? You don't do guitars here?"

"We can, but I won't allow it."

… What?

"Guitar is the soul of men! It will be sad if the King of Blues, B.B. King, is to abandon his signature Lucille guitar, yeah? It will be even worse if Brian May from Queen is to abandon his Red Special!"

What the hell is this guy talking about?

"But Jimi Hendrix had burned quite a few guitars before, right?"

"That's not throwing away, is it? He's burning those as offerings to the god of rock! I can forgive that because he's Jimi Hendrix. Eh? You look pretty young, but you've actually heard of Jimi Hendrix before?"

"Eh? Yeah… I quite like him."

The eyes of the mister sparkled. Seemed like he's a die-hard fan of old-school rock.

"Oh, I see! I like his music best when he's at The Jimi Hendrix Experience, though after the Woodstock Music Festival, he…"

The mister suddenly began to chat excitedly… go back to your work already! I turned my head back slightly, and realized that Lucy had already run off to the faraway building to escape from all this. Damn traitor, that caused me to listen to the mister talking about the Woodstock Music Festival by myself for a full twenty minutes.

"… So do reconsider about throwing away your guitar. You should chase your dreams while you're still young!"

I could finally have the chance to interrupt, and thus I shook my hands hastily in denial.

"You're misunderstanding things. I'm not here to throw things away, but to get them back."

"Eh?"

I began explaining to the confused mister about how I accidentally threw away my bass.

The mister suddenly said this unexpectedly with tears in his eyes, "So… so that's how it is after all, it was the first time you purchased an instrument by yourself… a youthful memory that you'll not be forgetting anytime soon…"

Umm, I never said anything about me going to buy the instrument for the first time, right? Though you're not wrong to say that…

"You finally bought it after saving up your new year's money for so long. Even before you could play the bass well, you had already thought of the name for your future band, as well as the name for your very first album. However, your sister hates rock music, and she actually threw your bass away without your approval… regardless of the times, the rockers will always be facing the fate of being persecuted…"

Stop cooking up your own story!

"And so you've gone to the district office, and been directed here. I'm touched by how great you are. Remember to give it a lady's name after you've got your bass back!"

"Eh? Can I find it? You know it's been sent over here?"

"I don't. There are tons of rubbish sent here daily, so how could I possibly know that!"

Don't be that cold all of a sudden!

"I don't think you can get it back, yeah? I'll tell you first, but I cannot allow you to search in the compressing facilities, and don't even think about looking in the pit where everything has already been processed. I can allow you to take a search on the heap before our processes, but you'll be hindering our work."

"I see…"

Felt like the chances are slim. Perhaps I was really too naive?

"Speaking of which, when was your bass collected? Today? Don't tell me it's last week!"

"Umm… hmm… it's the day before yesterday."

The mister suddenly opened his eyes wide. "Day before yesterday?"

I nearly thought he was about to transform. I retreated a step back in shock.

"Is it already too late… if it was the day before yesterday?"

"Is it really the day before yesterday? That's impossible."

"Eh?"

"We only collect rubbish on Saturdays. You didn't take it here by yourself either, did you?"

I nodded my head in confusion. I did indeed take it to the rubbish collection center on Thursday night, and I didn't see it by Friday.

"Perhaps someone picked it up and took it away?"

"Eh…?"

If that's really the case, then it's hopeless. I definitely can't find it.

"The television and stuff there were gone as well, so perhaps…"

"Eh? Then it must be by the other operators!"

The mister crossed his arms and nodded his head as though he had figured out everything. Operators?

"You sometimes see some small trucks going around the city and broadcasting 'We're collecting large-sized rubbish for free', right? That. We call them weevils. See, all that rubbish has been pasted with stickers given out by the district office before they are thrown away, yeah? If so, it'll be a crime to take that trash away!"

"Then… do you know where the operators are?"

"Hmm…?"

The mister lowered his head and pondered for a while. I guess he wouldn't know that. We've come to this place already, and yet it was for nothing. So the chances of finding my bass is really zero? I nodded my head dejectedly in thanks towards the mister, and said, "Sorry for interrupting your work." I then started to make my way towards Lucy. Just then, a voice suddenly came from behind me.

"Oi! Hold on, boy. Where's your house?"

"Huh?"

"If it is within the working areas of the operators that I know, I can tell you about it!"

The instance I turned my head, the mister looked just like those muscular chaps similar to Freddie Mercury. He propped up his thumb and said, "You want to get back your beloved instrument, right? Then obviously I can't leave you by yourself!"

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