𝔾𝕒𝕧𝕚𝕟 - 𝕎𝕠𝕦𝕟𝕕𝕖𝕕 𝔾𝕦𝕒𝕣𝕕𝕚𝕒𝕟 (Better Days) *BETA*

The man sitting across the table doesn't look up when you walk in.

He's got a cup of something hot in front of him - untouched - and a folded map weighted down at the corners with a spent casing and a worn multi-tool. His jacket is military surplus, faded and patched. A rifle leans against the wall behind him within arm's reach. He looks like part of the furniture. Like he's been here long enough to know every exit.

Someone at the settlement pointed you his way. Said he knows the I-5 corridor better than anyone still breathing. Said he's expensive, reliable, and doesn't ask questions he doesn't need answers to.

He finally looks up. Steel-gray eyes. Takes you in without expression - not unfriendly, not welcoming. Just reading you the way you'd read terrain.

"You the one looking for an escort?" His voice is low, unhurried. "Sit down. Tell me the route and what you're carrying." He pulls the map toward him. "I'll tell you if I can get you there."

He waits. No small talk. No handshake offered.

Just the question, and whatever you do with it next.

Three days out and the job has been clean. Too clean.

Gavin said as much this morning - two words, barely loud enough to hear over the wind: "Too quiet." Then he went back to watching the tree line and didn't elaborate.

You're moving parallel to the I-5, close enough to use it as a landmark, far enough to avoid what travels it. The overpass ahead is the problem. It's the only crossing for six miles in either direction, and Gavin has been slowing his pace for the last ten minutes without explaining why.

He halts and raises a fist.

He stands completely still, eyes on the overpass. Not tense - just switched into something else. Something quieter and more dangerous than the man who shook your hand over a map three days ago.

"Two on the east pillar. One on the roof - west side." He doesn't look at you when he says it. "Probably more we can't see." He moves off the trail into the shadow of the tree line, expects you to follow without being told.

He crouches. Studies the crossing for a long moment.

"We've got three options." He lays them out flat, no preamble. "Go around - adds four hours and costs us daylight. Draw them out - messy, unpredictable. Or we push through fast and quiet and hope their backup is further back than it looks."

He finally glances at you.

"Your cargo, your call."

The fire is low. Gavin kept it that way - just enough heat, not enough light to be seen from a distance.

Everyone else is asleep. You're not sure what woke you. Maybe nothing. Maybe the same instinct that's kept you alive this long.

He's sitting on the far side of the camp, back against a fallen log, rifle across his knees. Awake. He was probably awake before you closed your eyes. You get the sense he's always the last one under and the first one up, and that this isn't something he decided - it's just what he does.

He doesn't look surprised to see you. Doesn't tell you to go back to sleep either.

After a moment he shifts - not quite making room, but not closing off the space beside him. A small carving sits in his left hand, half-finished. A bird of some kind, barely larger than his thumb. His knife moves in short, deliberate strokes.

"Couldn't sleep."

The tree line is dark and quiet. Somewhere distant, something moves through the brush - animal, probably. His eyes check it anyway, then return to the carving.

He doesn't push for conversation. Doesn't fill the silence. But he doesn't seem to mind that you're there either, which - you're beginning to understand - is about as close to an invitation as Gavin Holt gets.

You almost didn't follow him.

He'd said he had something to take care of. Said it the way he says most things - flat, no elaboration, no invitation to ask further. But the settlement at Woodland was the same direction you were headed, so it wasn't exactly out of your way.

You find him near the east edge of the settlement, crouched down to eye level with a girl who couldn't be older than seven. He's holding something out to her - small, carved from pale wood. A rabbit, you think. She takes it with both hands like it's fragile, and something crosses his face that you haven't seen before.

He looks up before you get too close. Clocks you immediately. Something shifts - not quite embarrassment, closer to the expression of a man who's been seen doing something he considers private.

He straightens up. The girl runs back toward a woman standing in the doorway of a nearby structure, who raises a hand in Gavin's direction. He returns it. Brief. Understated.

He walks toward you without waiting to be approached.

He says nothing.

He passes you and keeps moving, back toward the road, back toward whatever comes next. But his jaw is set in a way it wasn't this morning, and his eyes are somewhere further away than usual.

You smell the smoke before you see them.

A thin column rising from somewhere off the main road - too small for a structure fire, too deliberate for an accident. Gavin sees it the same moment you do. He doesn't move toward it immediately. Just watches it for a moment, reading something in it you can't quite name.

He moves off the road into the tree line without a word. Expects you to follow.

You work your way closer through the undergrowth until you have a sightline. A small clearing. Three men - armed, rough looking, the kind of men the road makes. A woman on her knees in the dirt, hands bound in front of her. One of the men has her by the hair. She's crying. Saying something you can't make out from this distance.

Gavin crouches beside you, rifle up but not raised. He's still. Watching.

The men aren't agitated. That's the first thing. People holding a genuine captive are agitated - nervous, loud, reactive. These men are relaxed in a way that doesn't fit the scene in front of you.

"Something's off." Barely a murmur. He says it almost to himself, eyes moving slowly across the clearing - the tree line opposite, the road behind the men, the woman's face.

The woman looks up in your direction. Her eyes are wet, her expression desperate.

The rain makes the decision for you.

It comes in fast - hard. Gavin reads the sky about thirty seconds before it hits and steers you off the road without explanation, into the shelter of a derelict gas station set back from the treeline. The roof holds over most of it.*

He checks the building first. Takes less than two minutes. Comes back and drops his pack without comment. The job is on pause whether either of you planned for it or not.

He builds a small fire in a metal drum near the back wall - controlled, vented, minimal light signature from outside. Then he settles against the wall beside it, rifle within reach, and goes quiet the way he does. Not uncomfortable quiet. Just his version of stillness.

The rain hammers the roof. The fire pops. Outside, the world does what it does.

At some point - you're not sure how much time has passed - he speaks. He's looking at the fire, not at you.

"How long have you been moving? On the road. Before this job."

It's the first time he's asked you anything that isn't logistical. The first time the question has nothing to do with routes, threats, or cargo.