With the crate of bread he snached from the caravan, Zach started roaming the back alleys to hand out the loafs to the hungry. One starviving person knew him by name.

“Afternoon Mr. Avner, I have something for you” Zach said.

“Is it a buffet, Zach?” Avner asked.

“No but it is something to keep your stomach full”

“Every little amount helps you know.”

He takes the loaf of bread from Zach’s outstretched hand and tears it in two, taking the smaller half, Mr. Avner hands the other half back to Zach.

“Give this to the little ones, they need it more than me. They have a life to live, I have already lived mine.” Avner said

Without objecting Zach puts the half loaf back in the crate. He knew full well not to argue with Mr. Avner, he may be old, missing a limb, and malnourished but he was one of the Elite Connected. Lieutenant Avner Saxe lost his right leg when the caravan he was entrusted to protect was attacked by a rebel group known as the redcaps. Losing the caravan of medical equipment and part of himself, Avner was brought back to Trillith and was stripped of his rank. After Avner’s stump of a leg healed over he was promptly booted from the capital with nothing but the cloas on his back, a crude prosthesis, rations, and his weapon which was a scythe. He had been wandering the land until he found Chapin and settled in.

Zach bid Mr. Avner a good day and he continued with handing out the bread, he never took some for himself. After he dropped the crate off at the carpenter he headed home. When he opened the crude door of his shack and locked it behind him, he fell face first into his bed which was a canvas sack full of sawdust he got from the carpenter as a thank you for bringing him the crates for lumber. Sleep hit him hard and fast, and the next thing Zach heard was sirens in the distance. Another Incoherent has perished on the block. That makes 768 victims in the town of Chapin. Incoherents are what everybody calls normal people without the Connection and the reason why the Incoherent have been dieing is because of Dreadgrennes-Noughtres, a deadly bacteria later nicknamed the Dreadnought disease. The academy had reported that only the Incoherents could catch and perish from the Dreadnought disease.

Sitting up Zach saw that he had somehow stripped from his cloak and boots in his sleep. Zach jumped up from his bed and collapsed back down onto his bed. Woosy he shook his head to try to clear his head but it only made things worse, with as much strength Zach could muster he went over to the window of his shack and hoisted the yellow flag signifying that the occupant inside this shack might have the Dreadnought disease. Stumbling back onto his bed Zach waited.