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Guns, Grease and Gears;

Tales of the Post Apocalypse

by Mog Moogle

War.

War never changes.

The NCR expands and covets resources of the Wasteland like the nations of the old world.

A battered Brotherhood splits into factions as they struggle for survival.

New corporate enterprises take the place of roving bands of raiders and farm communities;

choking out the post-world entrepreneurs.

But war,

War never changes.

The flames licked the fox's face as he laid pinned under the overturned truck bed made into a caravan wagon. Mere feet from where he laid, the expression of his father's final moments frozen to his face as blood trickled from his nostrils and lacerations around his shattered skull. Just beyond his father's corpse was his nearly dead mother. The last of her strength trying desperately to cry for help but only coming out as gurgling as she choked on her own blood.

One of their attackers, a cheetah with singed and dirty fur wearing armor fashioned from hubcaps and old tires fumbled with the button fly of his tattered BDU trousers. He was about to rape his dying mother, and all the fox could do was look on in horror over the lifeless body of his father as it happened.

He cried for him to stop, begged and demanded that they just leave with the meager supplies the farmers had brought with them. Their worldly possessions of little interest to the carrion feeder opportunistic savages. They wanted more, and they would take it.

The cheetah grinned at him and assured him that he would get his turn too. Struggling as hard as his emaciated body could, he tried to pull himself free once more, but it was no use. His hot tears streaming his cheeks felt cool by comparison of the old drivetrain of the wagon as it smoldered. He swallowed hard and resided in his fate.

He watched the cheetah reach into his open fly just before a red puff sprayed from his chest. With a groan, the feline dropped to the dirt and laid as lifeless and unmoving as his father. A dull report echoed over him, followed by several more. He heard the other raiders around him shouting and spraying lead wildly in the direction of the reports.

Within moments, all was silent.

It seemed like hours passed as he looked at his mother. Her blood-stained eyes barely falling to his before her chest heaved, then fell back. The fox clawed at the dirt as he tried to pull himself closer, but he didn't move.

There were several dull footsteps approaching him. He sniffled back his tears and watched as a scuffed pair of leather boots stopped a few inches from his muzzle. A half-smoked cigarette fell to the ground and the boot lifted and stomped it, grinding it into the dirt to extinguish the cherry glow on the end.

He felt the wagon lift off his pinned back, and then felt a paw grip his collar roughly and drag him from his lying position to his feet with seemingly no effort. The crown of a gun barrel, bigger than a cannon to the fox's eyes stared him directly in the face. Just beyond it, a wolf in a faded black leather jacket and scruffy gray fur looked at him from over the top of the slide between the rear notch sights.

The gun dropped from his view and the wolf scowled at him. The fox swallowed hard as the wolf cursed under his breath. He turned away from the fox and started to walk away, stopping to pick up a communist era assault rifle laying at the head of one of the dead raiders. The wolf pulled the magazine free, looked at its opening, then haphazardly tossed both it and the rifle aside.

"Not even worth my fuckin' time," he said aloud. "Let alone the rounds I spent on their useless asses."

The fox looked down at the body of his father, then the cheetah and finally to his mother. He couldn't really process the images, and subconsciously shut them off. He looked back at the wolf as he walked away and took a step toward him. As soon as he moved, the wolf was facing him again with his pistol out of its holster and the barrel once again staring him straight in the face.

The fox took another tentative step forward, and the hammer on the back of the slide dropped. He closed his eyes as a click echoed in his ears, louder than any gunshot. He cracked them open as he heard another curse from the wolf. He watched the wolf holster his pistol and turn away, continuing to walk.

The fox took another step forward, then another, and another. Before he even realized it, he was only a few feet behind the wolf, following him toward the blazing heat of the Wasteland sunset.

"How I came to know."

The fox opened his eyes as the hum of the twelve-hundred horsepower electric motor that lulled him to sleep was still resonating inside the cab. He looked up at the windshield out of the spiderweb of cracked glass emanating outward from a bullet hole in the top right corner. Beyond the redish haze of the dust covered glass, he could see the ram scoop that pushed the air through the hole in the hood over the heatsync atop the motor.

He looked around the interior as he tried to get his barrings. The front was little more than two crude seats and a rollcage. Most of the gauges on the instrument cluster were gone, and the back housed several pieces of scavenged equipment where the rear bench used to be, nestled on either side of a large box with electrical lines running from the top of it to the floorboard and up through the firewall to the engine compartment.

Looking over at the driver's side, he saw the wolf sitting in the seat with one paw on the steering yoke and another on a steel rebar shifter with a cracked and yellow stained cue ball as the knob. As far as the fox knew, the sun had risen and set twice since he first stepped into the passenger side of the car and sat down, and the wolf hadn't stopped once.

The wolf's left elbow rested on the window frame as the cooler night air whipped through the cab. The parts that wore thin even looked like the original hide leather before it was fashioned into the bad-boy symbol it was to be hundreds of years ago.

The fox's bright, naïve green eyes would have stood in stark contrast to the sharp, cold and calculating faded blue of the wolf's. When the harsh glance met his own, the fox looked away quickly and sighed. He didn't know why he'd even bothered to follow the wolf that hadn't said a single word to him, and he wished that when that hammer fell, whatever caused that primer to not ignite would have just let him die with his parents instead.

The fox was distracted from his thoughts as he felt the car's forward momentum slow and the motor spool down. He looked out the windshield and then over at the wolf. The wolf was scowling at something unseen. He swallowed and looked back out of the windshield again.

"What is it?" he boldly asked.

"Not sure yet," the wolf replied. "Hopefully dinner." He paused and glanced at his instrument panel before looking back out of the windshield. "More hopefully, 'tricity."

The fox looked back out of the windshield and squinted but still couldn't see anything beyond the reds and yellows of the rising sun. He looked back at the wolf an observed a cruel smirk.

"Slavers," the wolf said. "Heavily loaded, lightly armed."

"Slavers?"

"You any good with a gun?" the wolf asked before putting on the brakes and slowing the car to a stop on the ruined highway.

"Gun? I've never used a gun. I don't even know how."

"What?" the wolf asked, almost dumbfounded. "Well, do you want to eat?"

The fox swallowed hard, looked down at his stomach and then back at the wolf and nodded softly. He watched the wolf turn the ignition off and reach behind him. After fumbling in the back seat for a moment, he pulled up a blued revolver and sat it in the fox's lap.

"You can have the supplies of anyone you kill," the wolf said coldly.

The fox touched the cylinder of the revolver with a shaky paw. He could smell the film of oil on the metal, and the coldness through his paw pads. He closed his eyes and saw the raiders as their rifle muzzles flashed, killing the farmers in their caravan as they laughed at the futile attempts of the helpless furs trying to flee.

Then something worse crossed his mind. He could kill this wolf. Take his car and sell it. He knew a working car had to be worth a small ranch. He could go back to raising brahmin in a small community of farmers like the one his parents were moving from when an NCR baron forced them off their land.

But actually taking a life ... any life, was something that he didn't think he could ever do.

"Something wrong, kit?" the wolf asked, causing the fox to shake off his fantasy.

"No ... nothing," he replied.

"You're a terrible liar," the wolf said as he reached over, picked the revolver off his lap and slapped the rough textured stock into the fox's paw.

"I ... I don't want to kill anybody. I don't even know how to use a gun."

"This ain't a negotiation," the wolf said. "Keep it out of sight until I start shooting. Line up the blade on the front with the notch on the back. Point it at the center of who you want to kill, then pull the trigger. You got six shots, so don't waste any."

The wolf opened his door and got out. He scrambled to catch up to the wolf, jogging until he was abreast of him. As they walked up the road, two caravan wagons pulled by brahmin came into view. Each wagon had a driver, and there were four other guards. One walking by each wagon and two behind a crowd of furs that all had their hands bound behind their back.

As they approached, the caravan driver in the lead wagon spotted them and waved his guard over. A burly tiger with a pump shotgun walked over to the driver then walked ahead of the caravan toward them.

"Get ready, kit," the wolf said. "They're going to play palsie then try to get the drop on us."

The fox's paw trembled as it held the revolver behind his back. The tiger got close enough for the fox to see his decayed teeth in his smile.

"Howdy there," the tiger said. "You two look like you might be short on supplies. Might you be looking to trade?"

"We could use some food," the wolf said as he kept walking toward the tiger. "If you can spare any, we'd trade for that."

"What do you have to trade?" the tiger asked.

"Some script, NCR or hub caps, whatever you prefer."

"Money? Heh, funny thing there, we got enough money," the tiger said as he readied his shotgun. "Boss thinks we might be a little short on slaves though, why don't you just-"

The next thing the fox heard was the ringing of two shots as the top of the tiger's head exploded in a red puff. The wolf sprinted toward the caravan driver past the falling corpse of the tiger as he tried to ready a sub machine gun. The machine pistol burped out a few rounds before a well placed shot from the wolf sent him tumbling back into the wagon.

The fox closed his eyes as he heard shots ringing from the surviving caravan driver and three guards. He heard a hiss whiz by his ear, then another. It only lasted a few seconds before everything was silent. He opened his eyes, fully expecting to see the wolf crumpled on the ground, but everyone but the wolf was still. All of the slaves previously under guard where face down in the dirt as they dove down to dodge the brief exchange of fire.

He sighed in relief as he saw the wolf standing atop the seat of the caravan wagon and rummaging through the back. He tried to walk forward, but his legs felt like rubber. He closed his eyes and grit his teeth. It took everything he had to keep from fainting. He closed his eyes and saw the flashes of the gunfire, and he heard the gunshots still ringing.

He saw the cheetah smash his father's head with the butt of his rifle, then turn and shoot his mother in the chest. He saw the blood splattered from his parents down his front. He saw the wolf pulling the trigger, and this time, the bullet mercifully fired and tore between his eyes.

"Hey kit!" he heard from the wagon and he opened his eyes. "Get your useless ass over here!"

"Y-yeah ... I'm coming."

When he finally managed to compose himself, he joined the wolf by the wagon. He peered up into it as the wolf picked over some boxes over the still breathing body of the scruffy canine driver as his labored breath kept him clinging to life.

He diverted his eyes away from the sight as quickly as he could. He felt nauseous and weak. He probably would have thrown up if the slaves crowding around the wagon didn't divert his attention. One walked up to the wagon by the wolf and looked up at him.

"What we do now?" the young mouse in a tattered loincloth and chest wrap asked with tribal charm. "You master now?"

"Do what you want," the wolf said as he didn't stop working. "Live. Die. Just do it away from me."

"What you mean?"

"I said, fuck off!" the wolf yelled as he drew his pistol and pointed it at her head.

She tumbled back and almost fell over her own feet as she tried to scramble away. Most of the others did the same, running away from the wagon as fast as they could. A few of the older or better educated victims of the slavers saw through the wolf's malice. One elderly raccoon even thanked him before turning away and walking into the wastes. Something which was sure for most of them to be a slow death of thirst.

The fox walked over to one of the sickly brahmin pulling the wagon and stroked one of its two muzzles. He sighed to himself as he looked back at the wolf. He was mumbling curses under his breath as he holstered his weapon and continued looking through the wagon.

"Kit!" he yelled.

"Yeah?" the fox replied timidly.

"This bastard's not dead. Finish him off."

"What!? I can't do that."

"Look, I'm running low on .223, and I've only found twelve more rounds in this junk heap so far. We got plenty of .44 magnum. So kill him."

"I can't," he said.

"That's fine. I guess you can go hungry," the wolf said before picking up a crate and tossing it out of the wagon.

The fox held the revolver in front of him as he moved his thumb over the hammer. He pulled it back and the cylinder rotated as it locked into full cock.

"It's a double action, kit," the wolf said. "Just point and click."

He walked to the wagon and looked in at the canine laying in the bed bleeding. By his face, he didn't look any older than the fox was. He pointed the muzzle of the revolver at the canine's head and clenched his teeth. He felt the heavy weight of the revolver tugging it downward.

He couldn't bring himself to do it. He closed his eyes and the image of his father taking the rifle butt to his skull flashed across his mind again. He yelled as loud as he could and felt his wrist jerk. It was surprisingly mild.

He opened his eyes to see smoke trickling up from the barrel and beyond the blade of the front, the young canine laid in the bed of the wagon with a new hole in his chest, and he was completely still. He dropped his arms to his sides as they went limp. Tears started to stream down his cheeks and as he chokingly sobbed.

"See, that wasn't so bad," the wolf said as he looked down at the fox. "What's your name, kit?"

"My, name?" he said as he suppressed his crying. "Johnny."

"Johnny? Heh, must be a farmer thing. 'Name's Colt. Story is my dad killed himself with a colt the day I was born, so they named me after the gun that finally got rid of the mean sonuvabitch. Or so I'm told."

Johnny looked up at the wolf and nodded, then down at his limp paw still clasping the revolver. The worst thing about it was Colt was right. It really wasn't so bad.

"Guns and Glory."

Johnny was setting the last crate of what Colt had picked out of the caravan into the trunk of the car. He saw Colt step around to another crate he had loaded and pull out a red box with a faded tri-foil on the side. The wolf reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small device with a digital display. He touched it to the two terminals on the top of the box and shook his head.

"Damn, not even enough juice to spark," he said before tossing the microfusion cell into the wastes.

"Juice?" Johnny asked as he looked at the wolf curiously.

"Yeah, kit. Juice, power, 'ticity," he explained. "If we don't get more soon, we're going to be doing a lot of walking."

"Ah. Okay," Johnny said before Colt looked at him and shook his head.

Johnny watched Colt as he walked around and got into the drivers side door. He scrambled to get in the passenger side himself, settling in just as the wolf toggled the start switch. The motor whirred to life and the wolf popped the clutch, causing the car to jump forward and in an instant travel faster than a deathclaw at full sprint.

The fox watched the wolf's paw as he ran through the gears, each time the car would accelerate faster until the wind whipped around the cab from the two open windows. Johnny watched as the soiled headfur on Colt's head was tossed around as he drove on the paved remnants of the past. The wolf glanced at him and caught him in his stare, and Johnny quickly looked away.

"So, kit," Colt said loud enough to be heard over the motor and the wind, "I'm curious. Why did you follow me?"

"I ... I don't know," Johnny managed as he recalled the bodies of the raiders strewn around. "Mom and dad were dead. The way you looked at me when I started following you, I thought you were going to kill me."

"It wasn't for lack of trying. Damn ammunition I've been scrounging as many duds as live rounds," Colt commented.

"When you, got in your car," Johnny paused as he recalled the event, "you looked at me like that again. I thought you would kill me again. Why didn't you?"

"Well, kit, in all honesty, the only reason I didn't was because I was amazed you had the audacity to even get in my car." Colt laughed and shook his head.

Johnny managed to smile at the wolf before looking back out of the windshield. The superhighway of the old world stretched out beyond them farther than he could see. The bits of recycled material and distant mountains that made up the pavement in surprisingly good shape for being nearly one-hundred and fifty years old.

The landscape changed from the flats of the open wastes to softly rolling hills, then more mountainous passages before the car began descending down the opposite side deeper into California. He thought about the farm where he grew up. Rows of corn that stretched in seas of greens and then golds as the autumn temperatures dropped to a chilly one-hundred and twenty degrees. The pastures of brahmin grazing fields where the two-headed beasts would graze on the Wasteland shrubs. It was a stark contrast to the mountains.

He thought about the furs in black combat armor and firearms that looked newer than anything pre-war he'd ever seen. They flashed a deed saying that their land they'd settled on was no longer theirs, and it now belonged to someone that lived hundreds of miles away in Shady Sands. They were given no choice or say. The whole community uprooted as NCR sharecroppers moved in under guard of the baron's mercenaries.

It set the whole chain of events in motion that led to everyone he'd ever known and loved being killed as they pushed on from their old home to find a new one. For a moment, he even felt enraged. Then he remembered the wolf. The sounds of the gunshots, the raider collapsing to the ground in front of him. He wasn't sure if it was a blessing or a curse that Colt had pulled him from under that burning wagon.

Johnny glanced over at Colt as he stayed focused on the curving roads. He looked at his rigid jaw and the collar of his jacket. His toned chest, much more healthy than almost anyone he'd ever seen before. Trailing down his body a little more, he realized where his eyes were going and looked away.

"So, how did it feel when that revolver preached Wasteland justice, kit?" Colt asked.

Johnny moved his paw over the outline of the gun in his pocket. He felt the cylinder and stock through the burlap rags his mother had fashioned into clothes for him. He quivered then shook his head. "It felt terrible."

Colt looked over at him and smirked. "Yeah?"

"I don't know how you can do it," Johnny admitted.

"Hate to tell you, but if you want to survive out here, killing will become second nature, kit."

"But I don't want that!" Johnny said as a tear streamed down his cheek.

"That's fine, but if you don't defend yourself out here, you'll be nothing more than a corpse," Colt told him as he reached behind his seat and picked up a bundle of cloth and tossed it in Johnny's lap. "Here. You've earned this."

Johnny looked at the bundle then back at Colt. The wolf ignored him and continued looking out of the windshield as the roads began to straighten toward the base of the mountain. He took his paw and tugged the tattered piece of cloth that held the bundle together. He opened it up and saw several pieces of dried brahmin jerky.

His hunger immediately overwhelmed all of his emotions as he picked the large piece off the top and shoved it entirely into his mouth. He soon realized that it was a mistake. It was so tough that he could barely chew it. The flavor was bland, but at least it wasn't rancid like the last bit of meat he'd eaten was. It was dry, and it sopped up what little saliva he could muster. With some effort, he finally managed to get the piece chewed enough to swallow.

His discomfort at eating the meat was instantly assuaged as his starving stomach finally had something other than Wasteland dust in it.

"Two weeks?" Colt asked.

"Two weeks?" Johnny repeated, confused by the query.

"Since the last time you ate?"

Johnny looked down at the jerky then back at the wolf and shook his head. "Closer to a month, I think. I stopped keeping track."

Colt laughed and shook his head. "We might get a little thirsty from time-to-time, but at least you won't have to worry about being hungry with me." Colt paused as he looked at the fox. "As long as you keep earning your keep, anyway."

Johnny shook his head and sighed. "As long as I can kill, you mean."

"That, and anything else I can think of. You're not much of a protege yet," Colt said as he reached back again and pulled out a clear plastic bottle with a murky brown liquid in it. "Here."

Johnny took the bottle from him and opened the twist cap. He gave the liquid an experimental sniff. Strong hints of acetone wafted into his nose and he recoiled.

"You purify with what you can," Colt told him. "It won't taste good, but you haven't had anything to drink in at least three days, kit."

Johnny looked at the bottle then put it up to his mouth. The mostly water mixture of dirt and turpentine poured down his throat and he swallowed it as fast as he could. It was far worse than anything he'd ever drank before. Johnny emptied the bottle then shook his head as he grunted. "It doesn't seem like there's much good about being in the wastes," Johnny pointed out before re-capping the bottle. "Why don't you settle in a town or something?"

"They don't fit me," Colt said. "Don't get me wrong, I love a good cat house, but easy access to whores isn't enough to keep me around all of these idiots out here trying to scratch their way from one day to the next."

"So, where are we going then?"

"Don't know," Colt answered. "Never been out this way, but if you stick to the roads, you run into population centers. Old cities are good places to scavenge and trade."

"So, you just wander around then?"

"I'm a drifter. I drift."

"You never wanted to just, stop and stay somewhere."

"Kit, I'm way too good at what I do to live anywhere around anyone with a shred of decency."

"And what is that?"

"Kill," Colt replied with no flux in emotion.

Johnny hung his head and sighed. "I still don't know how you can do that."

"Believe it or not, I know what you're going through right now. The first time I killed it tore me up pretty bad, too," Colt said and then paused before looking over at Johnny. "I was ten years old, and I was with the only friend I had growing up, my brother. He was eight, I think. Don't really remember now.

"We'd been looking for a part for this car for days. A simple little relay switch between the starter and the ignition. But, three days in and we hadn't found shit. Sometime around noon the next day, he and I had split up as we combed through the Boneyard in the piles and piles of junked cars. After awhile, I got worried and went looking for him.

"I found him in the middle of three corpses that looked like a group of scavengers. As I walked up to him, I noticed he was eating something. I asked him what it was, and he didn't answer. Neither of us had eaten in a long time, and we made a promise that whatever we found, we would share.

"As I got closer, he stood up and ran away. I chased him for an hour through that pre-war center of the city's filth. I chased him through the junkyard, the clearings made by scavengers, the shanties furs lived in.

"He finally collapsed from exhaustion. When I got up to him, he had a package of pre-war pastries in his paws. I was so enraged that he'd found such a treasure and not shared it with me that I collapsed on him and started beating him. I hit him until I lost feeling in my paws, until all my knuckles were broken and it hurt my fingers to move them.

"My fit of rage subsided, but my brother was long dead before that. His face was caved in, his muzzle shattered, and pink stuff was running out of his ears. I'd only seen that one other time when a car fell off a trash heap on one of my neighbors. I knew I had killed him."

The wolf looked back at Johnny and laughed out loud at the look of shock on the fox's face. Johnny shivered all over at the wolf's recanting of the story without showing a hint of emotion. "You, killed your own brother."

"Yeah, kit. I killed him. I don't think he suffered long though. He stopped whimpering after the first few hits. It tore me up for a long time, but when I had to kill again, it was much easier."

"How could you do that?"

"I thought I explained it. I beat him to death."

"No. No!" Johnny yelled. "You didn't! You couldn't have!"

"Settle down, kit."

"No! You're not a murderer. You killed those raiders and saved me, you killed those slavers and you set the slaves free."

"And I tried to kill you when you followed me. I would have killed that mouse if she was stupid enough not to run from me. I've killed the 'innocent' before, and I will again. Do you think it would have made any difference if that slaver caravan had been nothing more than simple merchants trying to make a living?"

Johnny looked at the wolf as if he should give the answer that he wanted to hear.

"No, it wouldn't have. I would have killed them, taken what I needed and kept going. I need food, fuel for my car and ammunition. I take it by force. That's just the way it is."

"That's not true!" Johnny snapped, but was cut off from saying anything else as Colt's pistol pressed against the side of his head. He swallowed hard as the wolf pulled the hammer back with his thumb and put his finger on the trigger, all the while never looking away from the road in front oh him.

"I'm not going to ask again," Colt said with a chill that froze the fox to the core. "Settle. Down."

Johnny sighed nervously in relief when the wolf put his thumb on top of the hammer and walked it down without striking the firing pin. He watched the wolf holster it and put his paw back on the steering yoke.

He laid his head against the door panel and sobbed to himself. He closed his eyes, trying to escape his feelings, but he saw images of the dead raiders. He saw his dead mother and father. He saw the dog he'd finished off in the bed of the wagon. He saw Colt beating his brother to death as he recalled the vivid details he'd been told.

When he opened his eyes again, the mountainscape was nowhere around him. He sniffled as he looked up out of the windshield and saw distant lights on the horizon. Looking over at Colt, he saw the wolf move the shifter into neutral and the car slowed as it coasted.

"What is that?" Johnny asked.

"Settlement," Colt replied. "Hopefully they have a bar. And a brothel. I could use some booze and some pussy."

"I know what a bar is, but what's a brothel?" Johnny asked.

"Whores, kit."

"Oh! Girls that have sex a lot. There was one in our little farming village that her dad always called a whore."

"Uh, no. Not really. Girls you toss a few caps at to get down with."

"Wait ... pay for sex? Why would anyone do that?"

Colt looked over at him with a scowl, then sighed and shook his head. "You really need to get out more."

Johnny blinked as the car stopped and Colt got out, well far away from the settlement. He opened his door and followed the wolf. As he caught up with him, Colt chuckled out loud.

"Tell you what, kit. If they got a cat house, I'll get you whatever you want. This one's on me."

"Wait ... me? Pay for sex?"

"Yeah."

"No, I don't ..." Johnny sighed. "I always wanted my first time to ... mean something."

"First time? You're a virgin?"

"Yeah?" Johnny replied as if it was completely normal.

"Huh, guess I shouldn't be surprised. How old are you?"

"Sixteen," Johnny replied.

"What the hell have you been doing on the farm for the last sixteen years if not fucking? Surely that slut you were talking about, or a brahma if you're desperate. Had to be something."

"I ... I just never ..." Johnny hung his head as he felt a little ashamed. He knew it was kind of unnatural, even in a farm community as remote as his was. He just hadn't ever found anyone he was attracted to, and he personally believed that to be important.

"Chin up, kit," Colt said. "You've already popped a few cherries with me. I don't mind getting you your first lay." Colt chuckled and then slapped the young fox on the back. "Speaking of which, still got that magnum on you?"

"Y-yeah ..."

"Don't like it?"

"It's just, I don't know. I don't know if I'm cut out for using a gun."

"Don't sweat it. Just keep it on you and out of sight. Stick with me for long, and you'll be as comfortable using it as you will be railing a hooker for the whole fifty caps she's worth."

They approached the gate and saw a lemur standing in front of a rickety chain link fence stretched across the road. He was wearing highly polished metal armor and had an assault rifle. The lemur raised his rifle at them and commanded them to keep their paws where he could see them. Johnny's arms shot up above his head. He glanced over at Colt and saw the wolf with his arms at his sides, his palms facing the guard. Colt's gesture caused him to relax a bit.

"What's your business in Amnesty?" the lemur demanded.

"We're just wanderers," Colt repleid. "We were hoping to get a drink in your bar and barter for supplies, if we can"

"Well, you're a little early," the lemur said. "We've only been in business here for a month. Most of the amenities aren't set up yet. We have a no bullshit policy. Your weapons stay holstered at all times. No exceptions. The 'runners don't take kindly to anyone starting trouble."

"'Runners?" Johnny whispered to Colt.

"Gun Runners, kit," Colt said. "I would assume, anyway. This doesn't look like a drug den or a slaver hub."

"Observant one, ain't you wolf?" the lemur said as he lowered his rifle. "The general store has a few things, it's in the fence a bit and to the right. Old pre-war motel, can't miss it. Over on the east end is the 'runner's office. See them if you want some work. They're always looking for some extra bodies."

"The bar?" Colt asked.

"Pending a shipment of booze, it'll be across from the general store. Nothing there yet though," he muttered, obviously as disappointed as the wolf.

"Fine," Colt said as he looked over at Johnny. "Go get the car, kit."

Johnny looked at him and blinked. "Me? I don't know how to work a car."

"You've been riding with me for three days and you haven't learned shit about it?"

"No. Well, yeah, but ... I don't want to break anything. You'd never forgive me."

"Yeah, so be careful with it," Colt said before fishing the coded ignition key out of his pocket and holding it out in front of Johnny.

Johnny looked up at the wolf defeated. He sighed and reached for the key, but Colt pulled it back just as his paw went to grasp it.

"On second thought, I'll go get the car," Colt said as he turned and walked away.

"But, but I-"

"Relax, kit," Colt said as he waved him off. "I was only teasing you. Try not to bug the guard, too much."

Johnny watched dumbfounded for a moment as the wolf walked back into the darkness. It took him a few more moments to realize that he was staring at the wolf's tail. He felt something funny in his chest, something like he'd never felt before.

"What was that about?" the lemur asked, pulling Johnny's attention away as he turned to the guard.

"Oh, uh, Colt's just going to go get his car."

"Go get his car?"

"Yeah," Johnny paused as the lemur looked at him with a curious stare. "I know it sounds crazy, but he has a car. And, and it works."

"What do you mean, 'it works?'"

"He's got a car. He put it back together and it runs and goes, and everything. I'd never seen one until I met him."

"I ... see. Are you okay?"

"Yeah," Johnny stopped and chuckled. "I know how it sounds, but you'll see when he brings it up."

Johnny looked back toward the dark highway and the lemur did the same. In the distance, they saw two glowing orbs light the highway up as they heard the soft electric hum whir up and the headlights moved toward them. As Colt pulled the car closer, Johnny walked to the other side of the road and then climbed in the passenger side.

He looked out of the open window on Colt's side to see the lemur standing there with his jaw dropped. Colt chuckled then shrugged.

"You mind getting that gate, buddy?" the wolf asked.

The lemur shook his head and then walked over to the fence. He took his paw and tugged on the old metal until it swung open on bailing wire hinges. They pulled into the small hub and down the highway that was the makeshift main street for ramshackle buildings that served as warehouses, stables and barracks.

As they pulled up to the motel that had an illuminated sign, Colt read aloud, "Tabby's Inn & _Genral_Goods." He emphasized the misspelling on the sign as he spoke. Colt sighed as he pulled under the decaying overhang in front of the office. "Well, it doesn't look nearly as exciting as I hoped, but at least we'll get to sleep in a bed tonight," Colt said as he shut off his car.

Johnny thought about the bed back home. The simple cornhusk stuffed mattress with the quilt his mother had made him when he was little. He sighed softly and nodded. "It's been over a month since I slept in a bed."

"We got that in common," Colt told him before he opened the door and stepped out.

They walked into the office and saw several makeshift shelves with assorted junk on them. Behind a desk in the back was a slender raccoon in a dirty pre-war dress. Her head was in her paws, snoring softly.

"Too bad this shit looks worthless, eh kit?"

"Why is that?" Johnny asked.

"'Cause we'd have found a haul to take right out from under the nose of that malnourished proprietor."

Johnny frowned and shook his head. He walked with Colt up to the counter and the wolf slapped his paw down on it hard. The raccoon jumped at the sudden start and looked up at the two.

"Oh. Oh! Welcome. Don't see many new faces yet. You need a room?" she asked, obviously happy to have any customers.

"Yeah," Colt responded as he idly looked around.

"Great. Room for two?"

"Yeah, how much?"

"Seventy-five caps."

"Seventy five? Kind of steep isn't it?"

"Not for two. That's cheap," she beamed.

"How much for one, then?"

"Thirty-five. So, you see, you're actually getting a discount."

"Yeah, if five caps more is a discount," Colt said as he palmed the stock of his pistol, but didn't draw it when he felt Johnny's paw tugging his jacket sleeve. The wolf sighed and reached into his left jacket pocket and pulled out a leather bag tied around the top. He tossed it on the counter with an audible chink. "Last I counted, there was eighty-three caps in there. Keep the change."

"Thank you, sir!" she said happily before turning around and picking one of three keys off a peg behind her with a red tag on it. "It's down the hall, first door on your left."

"Thanks," Colt said sarcastically as he snatched the key from her paw.

Johnny followed Colt until he stopped at the first door he saw. It was rotted and barely hung on its bottom hinge. It had obviously been kicked in at some point, and the lock sat several inches back from the splintered frame. Colt looked at the door, then down at the key in his paw and back at the door. He tossed the key over his shoulder and pushed the door open.

As they walked into the room, Johnny saw a simple double mattress sitting on top of boxsprings that looked as if they'd seen much better days. Johnny sighed, but thought to himself that some comfort was better than the none that he'd had. He watched Colt take his jacket off and then he turned to face him.

"For what it's worth, shut the door, kit."

Johnny turned around and picked the door up off the floor where it dragged and did his best to seat it back into the frame. As he turned around, he saw Colt peeling off a white undershirt that was stained yellow with sweat and dirt. As it came off over his head, he saw the white patch on the wolf's stomach that ran up to under his muzzle. His toned chest was even more visible than it was with his shirt on.

Johnny looked away as he felt his cheeks heating up. He heard the wolf yawn, and he couldn't help but look again. The wolf flexed his arms and chest as he stretched. Johnny watched as he moved his arms behind his back and stretched again. Colt moved his paw back to his shoulder as he rubbed out the soreness, but stopped and cocked his head as he looked at the fox.

"Jeeze, kit," Colt said then chuckled. "We really need to get you laid."

Johnny blinked then cocked his own head at the wolf. He saw Colt point his finger at the fox's midsection. Johnny looked down and saw his paw on his crotch, squeezing his sheath. His heart instantly sank. He had just touched himself as he watched the wolf right in front him.

He didn't think he'd be able to contain his embarrassment, but what happened next sent it to levels he didn't even know were possible. Colt pulled his pistol from its holster and sat it on the bed. He kicked off his boots, unfastened the fly and tailflap, and dropped the ragged denim to the floor. Johnny saw every detail of the naked wolf as the denim covered nothing but his bare fur underneath.

The white patch around his gray fur ran all the way down between his legs, and when Colt turned around to sit down on the bed, he could see just where it ended between the wolf's cheeks. The loose fitting burlap pants the fox wore were as tight as they could be as he watched the wolf shift around on the bed into a comfortable position.

Johnny looked the wolf over as his blush filled splayed ears twitched. "I'm sorry," he eventually said.

"Sorry?" Colt asked, peeking up from the single pillow at him.

"For ... touching myself."

"Christ, kit. It's not big deal. It's not like you were trying to get your dick in my ass."

Johnny went wide eyed then looked away as he blushed. He felt his member twitching in his pants as it strained against the course fabric. He couldn't help but imagine what it would actually feel like to 'get his dick in Colt's ass.' He pictured the wolf doing the same to him.

"You going to sleep, or are you going to stand there all night?" Colt asked before laying his head back on the pillow. "You just watching me is creeping me out."

"Oh, uh ... I'm sorry," Johnny said as he looked around the room. "Where am I going to sleep?"

"In the bed?" Colt said in a mater-of-factly tone.

"You mean, with you?" Johnny asked as he felt his heart skip a beat. Colt didn't reply. Johnny timidly walked up to the bed and looked down at the wolf. His eyes were half open, and Johnny thought that they looked up at him as he stood over the wolf. "Colt?"

The wolf's reply was a soft snore. He had fallen asleep with his eyes open. Johnny swallowed hard as he pulled the shirt off over his head and dropped it on the floor. He decided it might be best to leave his pants on as he went to the foot of the mattress and climbed on top of it.

He turned his back to the wolf and tried to lay his head on the pillow, but it too small to share two heads. He eased his body back a bit until his cheek could lay against the pillowcase, but found that by the time he had enough room to do it comfortably, his bare back was against Colt's bare chest.

Every exhale of the wolf's breath hit the back of Johnny's neck. The feel of another in the bed with him made his heart flutter and kept his pants tight. He wished the wolf would wrap his arms around him and claim him as his own.

He wanted Colt. This heartless monster that killed as easy as he could breathe, that had no qualms about stealing or taking advantage of others. The white knight that rode in on a metal steed and saved his life. His surrogate role-model for lack of his parents.

Murder. Thief. Lecher. Hero.