I stumble for an hour, then another, up crumbling canyon walls, down dry streambeds, ducking, looking back constantly. Wishing I had eyes in the back of my head so my neck wouldn’t hurt so much from trying to look two ways at once.
The kitties are mewing just loud enough they’ll give me away if those bastards get too close. I tear off my shirt and wrap it around the box, gotta muffle that sound and keep the box from heating up too much. Plus who knows what’ll come running, worse than thugs, at the sound of a struggling animal. The thought chills me, turns my sweat cold, which is kind of a relief in the heat. Being scared out of your mind has some fringe benefits, turns out.
I’m working on a sunburn twenty minutes later, but it’s better than being shot or eaten alive. I try to keep the small things in perspective like my old man taught me. I do okay except at the worst times, like when I decide to ditch off with a box full of kittens and royally piss off my now-former employer. Stealing from the big man has to be the last straw in our already strained working relationship. Oh well; plenty of other wannabe dictators to work for out there in the wastes. I’ll look for gainful employment just as soon as I’m sure I don’t die gut shot on a sandy stretch of ghostly creek bed.
I hear shouts, gunshots in the distance. They’re spread out all over, keeping tabs on each other by firing off their guns like good, stupid henchmen. Several times I switch directions, scramble down some boulders, around a corner to avoid the sources of gunfire, but mostly the sound’s confusing, echoing off the canyon walls, making it hard for me to be sure exactly which direction they’re headed. I try hauling my dragging-ass carcass up high on some rock, scalding my calloused hands and arms by grabbing the sun-scorched surface. The thugs aren’t far back, ever, not more than a mile, and they had the forethought to bring water with them, I guess. My throat’s in dire need of lubrication and my eyes are sore from sand-grit and dust. Sure could use a good washing out about now. I soldier on, though. At first, this was about sentimentality; now it’s about plain old survival. Don’t think I could live with myself if I let Saul and his boys kill me.
Sun setting, moon rolling up. What’s left of it anyway—big old shattered dinner dish in the sky, constant reminder that the world can’t never be put back together again. Air’s getting nippy, and everything’s coming to life around me. I skirt around an enormous sleeping rattlesnake and spook some spiky-haired rat-thing that shambles off, spines waving and prickly nose held high with offense. An hour after dusk, I still hear the shouts and gunshots behind me but eventually they go quiet except for one large volley of blasts that I suspect are intended to kill or maim something, rather than communicate. I hope whatever they’re shooting gets in a few licks of its own.
I stagger on, dust clinging to my hair in the grease I use to keep it slicked back and out of my eyes. I’m thinking about a nice, warm bath with a pretty lady when out of nowhere comes this behemoth of a man, dirty pinstripe gray suit, pistol leveled at my head.
“Give ’em up and I’ll kill you quick,” he says, voice like an avalanche. I’m shaking, adrenaline making me jittery, and he sees it, gets nervous. “Do it now!”
Got no choice now, I think, only there’s the weight of that wrench in my pocket, that fucking wrench that’s been slowing me down all afternoon. I’ve forgotten until now what it is. I lower the toolbox to the ground, heavy with sleeping feline, and take a short step back, putting my hands behind my head like I’m ready for him to just shoot me, praying he has the brains to check the box before he does.
Luckily the monster has a few brain cells not killed with shooting up Viper-venom. He slips right up in front of me, bending down to remove my sweat-stained shirt and flip up the lid—
Instead, I flip his lid. Quick as anything, like I was born for this shit instead of rebuilding carburetors, I bring up the wrench, striking him clean in the jaw with an honest-to-goodness uppercut swing that knocks him senseless. He collapses on top of the box. After, I look down at the bloody wrench in my hand in astonishment like the appendage belongs to a stranger. Lots of opportunity for violence in my life since the Crash, but I’ve always dodged by being good at fixing and driving things on wheels.
Muffled kitty noises under the body remind me I don’t have time to think about it. Soon as I stop shaking, I roll the body away, pick up my load, and take off, not looking back, not even for a second, not wanting to see a dead man any longer than necessary. Especially not wanting to see a dead man in the light of the FUBAR-ed moon. On I walk, hoping his ghost never tracks me down.
My neck’s stiff. My back burns like it’s been dipped in battery acid. My head feels like it’s wrapped in cotton. All I’ve had for sustenance is a beer and a couple of rabbit burgers two days ago, maybe a little stale pump water at the cantina. Enough for me to get around on wheels, but on foot, things are different.
For now, I keep putting one foot in front of the other—but I’m staying alert for any signs of water, food, anything. I think you can get water out of cactuses, but I haven’t seen any on these rocky slopes. I could find one in the canyon, but down there, I might also find a bullet with my name on it.
Got no choice but to tough it out. I can make it to Shantyville, I think. Dehydrated for sure, but alive. With the kittens in hand, they’d be sure to let me past the wall. They’d be fools if they didn’t.
Next thing I know, I’m crashing to the ground and I feel a searing pain in my ankle—twisted it good between a couple of rocks. A curse slips out of me—quietly, thank Chrysler—and I see that the box of kittens has tumbled open. They’re all wide awake now, the little devils, blue eyes glowing in the moonlight. Freedom, I can just see them thinking, and just like that, they scatter.
No way in hell I’m going to leave those beautiful babies to die in the desert, so I scramble to my feet, wincing from pain, and start trying to snatch them up. I get three pretty easy with a piece of string I find in my pocket, but the fourth, the tough bastard, he plays it cool, regards me from a perch high up in a dead tree. I’m torn between amusement and terror. That kitten has spirit, and I’m sure that this little fucker’s going to get me killed.
A couple thrown rocks later and the gray and white bastard’s backed up even further, hissing and spitting, looking at me as if to say, “I knew you’d betray me. It was only a matter of when.”
I don’t know if I’m still being followed, but either way, I’m wasting precious time, and this cat’s chosen his own path, so I start to walk off, as if I don’t need him, as if I don’t care if the bastard lives or dies. I get about fifty feet away and he buys it. I hear this soft pattering sound behind me, and when I look down there he is, trotting along after me. He stops, turns away, licks himself when I turn around, like, “Hey, I was going this direction anyway.” But he lets me pick him up and return him to the box, and finally I’m making tracks again.