Carmen felt her lungs expel a large breath that she hadn’t known she’d been holding as the woman stopped and called back to her: “Alright, girl.”. She didn’t want to admit to anyone, even to herself, how desperate she was: she was almost out of glass with which to make new spears or arrows, and although she wasn’t terribly far from the remains of a neighborhood littered with the stuff, she simply didn’t like those places. For one thing, she got turned around and lost easily, and more important, they really just creeped her out. 

Although she hadn’t gone anywhere remotely near relaxing, the threats over the dog sent her straight into full alert again. Bristling with anger mixed with fear but quite unable to inform Fren that she could go fuck herself, Carmen shouted, “Deal!” and whistled for Chester. The medium-sized canine skidded to a stop himself, [i]thankfully[/i] a somewhat-safe distance from the potential threat. Then, reluctantly, he shook his head and trotted back to her with his curly tail sticking above him. 

Carmen wasted no time in taking out her backpack. Out came the rabbit bones, which she’d tied into a neat bundle. A very old fork and a hefty bundle of pine needles soon followed. She looked toward Fren. It wasn’t much. As an afterthought, she pulled out one of her arrows and laid it out with the other items. Hopefully it would be enough. She reached out and tensely gave Chester a scratch behind the ear. 


---


Idly, Adrian sipped from a jar of very strong wine. It was made with...prickly pears, or something like that. It burned pleasantly and gave him a nice buzz on its way down, and he nodded approvingly at its taste. Wasn’t the best booze he’d had, but it certainly wasn’t the worst either. Unfortunately, he wouldn’t be able to get drunk on it. Not yet, at least. He was only having a taste while he waited for a delivery. 

His guy was late, as usual. And as usual, it pissed him right off. With a scowl he took a hefty gulp of the wine, swirled the remainder of the jar’s contents, and set it down. It was time, he decided, to go see what was up with this trade. Just as he got up though, he heard someone shout his name, followed by one of the most horrifying shrieks he'd ever had the displeasure of hearing. Nearly made him jump out of his own skin. [i]That[/i] wasn’t his delivery. 

He grabbed his wrench out from under the rickety chair he’d been sitting in and got to his feet. In a couple long strides he was at the door and flinging it open with vicious force. Being slightly drunk, he didn’t expect throwing the wrench at this Mile-High dude to work. Incredibly, he had a lucky throw. Oh, yes, very lucky. He hit the bastard right straight in the side of the head and then ran outside. 

“You were supposed to deliver my order and get the hell out of here,” Adrian snarled. As much as the wrench must have hurt, it had by no means knocked the man out. He was, however, able to wrestle the rifle out of his grip. (It was a nice rifle. Maybe he could sell it.) 

He turned his face to the younger man––almost a boy compared to himself––and practically barked the command, “Get inside. I’ll deal with him. He’s a...a business partner.” Naturally, he wanted to ask what on [i]Earth[/i] that shrieking thing was, and he also wanted to call the dude by his name. He knew he’d talked to him a couple times before, but it was with only a little guilt that he realized he couldn’t remember his name. Devin? Damien? Douglas? Whatever. There wasn’t time for that right now.