The Post-Post-Apocalyptic Story

"Sit down." Sage tugged Dee over to the bench and sat down. He gave Moma a pointed look. "We're growing boys!"
"You better not grow any more, I don't want to add more cloth to the hems of your pants again." Moma teased. "It will be done in a minute. Go and get your sister, I need to see her face at least once a day."
"Come with me." he said to Dee, "She'll get less angry."

Dee got back to his feet, obediently, and motioned for Sage to lead the way. "Thank you, Moma," He said, bowing his head gratefully, on his best manners.

Moma smiled at him. Silly boy, being so formal, especially when she had always thought of him as practically one of her own.

Sage led him to the back room, Iris's room. Pulling the curtain aside, the room was small but, every inch of space, even the ceiling was utilized. The ceiling was covered with drawings and plans made on the rough paper that they made themselves. More plans were stretched out in front of Iris.
Iris sat on the floor with her back against a pile of pillows. Her desk, made out of a piece of flat metal was short so that it was the perfect height for sitting on the floor.
Iris had short cropped hair and a face with all the icey beauty of a marble statue. Her dark eyes glinted with excitement in the work she did, although she rarely allowed further expression to cross her face. If you somehow managed to distract her from her gadgets and inventions her eyes said don't approach me, I know that no one would want to come near me unless they had bad intentions.
Iris had a wooden cuff in place of a left hand, and to that cuff she attached various useful implements such as knives, hammers, and a set of curious pincers that were her own invention. She was also missing her right leg below the knee, all casualties of the cannibal's attack.
Iris wore a knee length dress made of patches of various colors and types of cloth, her one concession to the femininity that her name implied. Of course, she only wore a dress because it was easier to cover in pockets.
Today she was fiddling with a pair of goggly looking things with cones that you look through. Her long lashes drooped low over those lovely cynical eyes when she looked up at them, "Brother, how dare you bring someone in here when I don't even have my leg on."
The wooden false leg that she had carved herself, leaned against the wall all forlorn.
Iris winked at Dee.

Dee lingered respectfully by the curtain to the room, but his eyes seemed to glint a smile at Iris. He looked around the room at the drawings, wishing that he could get a proper look at all of the intricate plans, and wishing that he knew what half of them meant. "How are you doing, Iris?" He asked.

"Oh, Deandros! Just the person for the new glasses I made. Try them on. They are for hunting, so that you can see your prey from a great distance." Iris held out the bulky goggles she had been fiddling with. They looked truly ridiculous with long cone shaped sections of metal and glass in the front. Her tail perked up as though it were happily awaiting his response.
Looking through them really did seem to magnify your surroundings but, imperfections in the glass made everything a bit fuzzy and indistinct.
"Even if those things work you would have no perepheral vision." Sage said, "A big bear could walk up right beside you and you would never know it."
"Do you have to piss on everything I do?" Iris snapped, "Damn it."
Sage, who had always been jealous of her cleverness but, loved her in spite of it, said, "Maybe for the guard tower . . .?"

Dee carefully examined the glasses, biting back any laughter or impolite comments he might have. " I think they would be perfect for the guards in the watch tower," He said, finally, looking through the cones again, his magnified green eyes blinking at Iris and Sage.

Sage laughed, "You are so gorgeous Dee, I think they suit you."
"YOU have no perepheral vision." Iris said to her brother.
Sage shrugged, "No, you are thinking of depth perception." He turned to Dee, "I walk into things sometimes." He laughed again, as though everything about the situation was too funny to stand.

Dee took the goggles off, blinking rapidly to readjust his eyes to the normal world, "Well, they are extremely . . . . nifty," He said, handing them back to Iris, and looking back around at the drawings, "What will you make next?"

Iris scratched her head thoughtfully, "I don't know. It depends on what parts we can scavenge."
Iris and Sage sometimes went to what could have been a treasure trove from an ancient civilization, or simply their garbage dump, to hunt for scrap metal. They kept the location secret from the rest of the village although, in all likely hood they needn't have worried about someone stealing their spot since it was perilously far from the village.
Sage had offered to take Dee with them once or twice in the past.
"Lets go eat before Moma takes all the soup with her and gives it away." Sage suggested.
"Help me up." Iris reached out for Dee to give her a boost.

Dee reached out and took Iris' right hand and her left elbow, pulling her up easily, and holding her in an upright position. His arms had been growing stronger with all of the practicing and hunting he'd been doing, and he thought Iris was very light.

Iris smiled at Dee. Somehow she was just lately noticing that he was a man now, and not the melancholy boy that she remembered.
While Dee was supporting her weight, Sage brought her wooden leg over and carefully fastened it on with a series of leather belts that wrapped around her leg up to her thigh. Almost nothing could knock her out of her leg when it was properly secured.
Now she could stand and walk on her own.

Dee let her go, after making sure she had her balance. "Soup?" He said, eagerly, to Sage, not being able to contain his eagerness for food.

The three of them went out to the main room and sat down at the table.
Medicine Moma poured each of them a bowl of potato and herb soup in a clay bowl. She poured a fourth bowl and covered it with a wooden lid, "That is for your new friend, don't get hungry on the way home and eat it up." she teased Dee.
Moma put the rest of the pot of soup on a wagon and left to go eat supper with a hungry family, as was her tradition.

"She would rather feed them then her own family." Sage griped, in between bites of soup.
"You're just greedy." Iris said.
Sage had no ready argument for that statement.

Dee tried not to eat it too quickly and just be rude, but he wasn't allowing time for speech in between mouthfuls of potatoes and herbs and broth. About halfway through the bowl he closed his eyes happily, continuing to eat.

When next Dee looked up, both Sage and Iris were watching him. The twin expressions could be best summed up by the term amused fondness.

"You can have the rest of my soup." Sage pushed his one third full bowl towards Dee.
"No, he can finish mine, I can't possible eat the rest." Iris slid her half full bowl in front of Dee.
"You are just trying to upstage me!" Sage said, outraged.
Iris sniffed at him derisively, "Go pay attention to some females for a change. You spend to much time looking at other men."
Sage was stunned into silence for a moment. "I . . . it's none of your business anyway." He stuck out his lower lip sadly.

Dee looked faintly embarrassed, blinking at them, "No, no," He said, gently pushing both bowls back to their owners, "You can finish your soup. I'll do just fine with this. Thank you. You are both very kind," He said, quickly, trying to put out the fire.

"You need it more then we do." Iris poured both bowls of soup into Dee's bowl. "Sorry to fight in front of you, we really can't help it."
Sage pouted silently, feeling that he had somehow lost something important.
"Will you stop being such a baby?" Iris asked Sage.
Sage looked down at the floor sadly.
Iris sighed. "Come 'ere."
Sage went to Iris and she hugged him. She hated to say that she was sorry but, this was about as close as she got.
Sage leaned his head on her shoulder, "It's okay. As long as you don't try to take Dee away from me anymore." He cast a playful smile in Dee's direction.
"Oh, you! I thought you were sad." Iris bopped Sage on the head.
Sage sat back down, "I think someone else already stole his heart away, anyways. You should see Ume."
"That naked mystery guy that they were telling us about?" Iris asked, intrigued.
"Yes, you have to meet him." Sage assured her.

"No one has stolen my heart," Dee said, in alarm, between gigantic mouthfuls of soup, "I don't know what we are talking about anymore," He drank some of the broth.

"We're talking about Ume. He has green hair like . . .new plants, very bright. And the most dazzling golden eyes, like the metal gold, not like wheat. He could hypnotize people with those things. Maybe he DID hypnotize me." Sage said, considering whether or not he had been hypnotized.
"Wow, sounds unusual." Iris said.

"I don't think I'm the one who's had his heart stolen by Ume," Dee said, wryly, while scraping the bottom of his bowl.

"Yeah, just a little." Sage admitted sheepishly.
"Just because you've pissed off all of the women our age in the village, doesn't mean you should give up on them all together." Iris said.
"Yep, it does mean that." Sage nodded solemnly.
"I want to be an auntie!" Iris teased.
"Pfft." Sage stuck out his tongue at her.

"Don't worry, Iris, I imagine he will have babies all over the place one day," Dee said, getting to his feet and stretching. His shirt rose over his belly a bit as he lifted his arms. It was very cute. "Thank you for the meal. I should get back home and bring Ume this soup,"

"If you must." Iris said, after she got done drooling over Dee's lovely, toned belly.
"Maybe I'll bring Iris with me to visit you tomorrow." Sage suggested.
"If I'm not busy." Iris said nonchalantly.

"You're welcome to come," Dee said, giving them a small smile, "I'll see you tomorrow, then," He took the bowl for Ume and nodded to them before leaving.
A few minutes later, Dee opened the door to his shack, quietly, looking up at the loft.

The lump of blankets up in the loft seemed to be singing softly, "Catch a Taily by the Po . . . Gruber Munchkin, Let them go. Dragons wafting to and fro, in the evening, in the snow . . ." It seemed to be the partially garbled remains of some kind of nursery rhyme or lullaby.