Fenris Perrywinkle: The Great Galactic Duel

Chapter III: Desert Confessional

My pants make a soggy slapping sound as I stride out of the gas station lavatory with as much confidence as I can muster. Amanda is scanning the horizon with an intense look on her face.

"Feeling a little fresher?" she asks without turning around to face me.

"Everything is fine," I assure her with as much zeal as a man that just washed his pants in a toilet can muster.

Mercifully, that's as far as the conversation goes.

"Come on," she commands. I follow her around the corner of the service station, which is the only structure in the vicinity. The highway it services is devoid of traffic. She looks around cautiously, then opens the door to an old Honda Civic. She motions for me to get in the passenger side.

"Can you hotwire a car?" she whispers.

"No. Can you?" I whisper back.

She rolls her eyes at me. "Didn't you pick up any skills in prison?"

"Well..." I know I shouldn't say it... but what can I say? I'm a born wise guy. "I got pretty good at hanging from the ceiling. Strangely, no one ever came and read Popular Mechanics to me."

She lets out a little sigh and her eyes start rolling around again. I spot something glinting between the driver sun visor and the car roof. I decide to make her work for it.

She glances out the rear window and hisses, "Well we've got to get out of here somehow! The Warden wants us both dead!"

"Why does he want you dead? I thought you worked for him?"

Amanda's lips purse for a moment before she answers. "We fought and argued about your treatment all the time. He kept hinting that I should accidently overdose you or something. I always refused and it made for a rather toxic working relationship. My skin would crawl every time that stupid little drone flew into my office."

"He wouldn't come see you in person?"

She shook her head. "I don't think the Warden was actually on site. I can't remember any of the staff saying they had ever met him in person."

She pauses, then reaches into her lap coat and produces the bottle of pills from Little Green. "Here. Take one. The little alien guy said two a day."

"And we're just going to trust him? Just like that? What about my regular medication? Am I going to lose my mind completely without it?"

Amanda scans the horizon for a moment before responding. "You'll be fine without it. Take the new meds. The little guy didn't seem like he was interested in hurting you. Just let me know if you have any strange sensations."

I cock an eyebrow. "Strange sensations like..."

"Just take the damn pill!" she commands.

"Yes, Dr. Vincent," I mumble and pop one of the green capsules.

She turns around and pounds the steering wheel with her hands. "We've got to get out of here! Why can't you start this car for us?"

I get a sly grin on my face. Time to be the hero finally. "I said I didn't know to hot wire, I didn't say I didn't know how to start it."

I make a deliberate motion of reaching over her, pausing at the sun visor, then flipping it down with one finger. A candy wrapper and pair of sunglasses fall into her lap.

The look she gives me can't really be described. I'm fairly certain I said "I dunno," as a reflex.

She lets out another long sigh. Like... really long. Like... 'I'm impressed with her lung capacity now' kind of long.