Drifter's Way
Chapter: 4 City Visits and Sour Notes
By Drifter Song
July 10 , 2002
Copyright Drifter Song 2000-2002, all rights reserved.
Silver was quite impressed with how easily he was able to handle Charley's motorcycle given the difference in size between the woman and himself. He found the ride to be comfortable even though he was nearly doubled over while he rode. He had to guess that it would be sometime after mid- afternoon, here on Earth, he almost wondered what it was like back on Mars, but he shook thoughts of home from his mind.
* * *
The sun was just starting to rise and spread its warmth over the red sands of Mars, not much was stirring at sunrise, at least not visibly. A small form made her way across the city that was waking slowly with the rising sun. She sighed, she hated this morning routine, really hated it. She stopped before a door of one of the houses and found Thor standing there.
"Is she not up yet?" the woman asked the much taller chestnut mouse, her voice was a bit on the husky side for one so small.
"I'm afraid not Vivian," Thor said in a soft yet resonating tone as he looked over his shoulder at the door behind him.
"Oye, what are we going to do with her," Vivian replied as she ran her a smoky grey hand through her fiery red hair. "I can understand her worries, but.she has a job to do. We all do. Silver's a big boy, he can take care of himself."
Thor nodded before speaking. "You're right, my dear sister." He then chuckled at her comment about Silver before continuing. "There is much that has to be done and worrying about his Lordship will do nothing to sooth the nerves I'm afraid."
"Maybe it's time for girl talk, one sister to another," Viv replied as she placed her hands on her hips, her dark fur stood out in contrast to her pale blue sleeveless top and beige pants. "You know I'm really starting to dread waking up in the morning."
Thor nodded once again as he stepped to the side to let his sister pass. Viv may be nearly three foot shorter then himself but that didn't mean she couldn't hold her own against her much larger sibling. She knew were to hit him where it hurts.
Weaving her way through the house Vivian stopped at the bedroom door and knocked. The only thing that greeted her back was silence. A frown then crossed her dark grey muzzle as she knocked again, still receiving no reply.
"Star?" Vivian called as she tried the door and found it unlocked. Opening the door she peeked her head inside to find the bedroom empty. Her long grey tail twitched slightly in frustration. "Hmmmm."
She turned and headed towards a different hallway, hoping that Star would be at the end of it.
* * *
The traffic was picking up in the large city as Silver drew closer and closer to the more populated areas. Once he found a spot that was just large enough to park the bike he maneuvered it into the spot and turned it off. He then leaned back so that he could sit up at his full height and looked around through the tinted visor of his helmet. Pale blue eyes took in the surroundings with intense curiosity as he dismounted. He has never been to a city of this size on Mars, let alone Earth. Silver figured he was in just as good a place to start looking for the items on the list, he turned to walk down the street, heedless of the odd looks that he got for keeping his helmet on. His gaze drifted from window to window as he made his way down through the shopping district of Chicago.
* * *
"You all right there, Charley girl?" Vinnie asked as he drew closer to the woman, lofting a furred brow.
"Yeah.Vinnie, I'm fine why do you ask?" Charley said after a few moments of silence as her gaze traveled from one helmeted face to another.
"Are you sure about that Babe?" Throttle asked as he too moved towards Charley and entered the Last Chance.
"Yeah," Charley replied with a crooked grin as she gestured with her one hand. "Why wouldn't I be?"
Charley just hoped that none of the guys asked about what was under the drop cloth that hid Silver's ride. That and she also hoped that none of the motorcycles reacted to one another, she really didn't want to have to try and explain who it belonged to and why it was there. In truth she didn't know the answer to the second part and that could be a major problem.
* * *
Heavy footfalls clacked upon the paved walkway as Silver made his way through the shopping district. What might have started out to be a short shopping trip, pending Chicago traffic at rush hour and a small bit of exploring the surrounding area, would be delayed due to a minor distraction. A distraction that would probably be more helpful then it was hindering. That distraction was a music store, or more pointedly an instrument store, which he found on his way back to Charley's motorcycle.
Pausing Silver looked at the door, brows furrowed in thought as he really should get back to the Last Chance Garage as he shifted the paper bag into the crook of his right arm. Instead of walking past like he should have he entered the store only to be partially assaulted by a racket that caused his ears to ring, even the tip of his tail twitched almost spastically around his waist.
"I'm terribly sorry about that sir," a man said as he came rushing out of the back room, shutting the door behind him, causing the sound to die down till it was muffled with a click of the sound proof door. "How may I help you?"
"No need to apologize, good keeper," Silver replied smiling slightly behind the deep smoke tint of his visor before his gaze left the middle aged man to sweep around the store. "I'm not sure, good keeper, I stopped in to take a look around."
"Well then browse away." the store owner replied before being rudely interrupted by a punkish looking teenager that came out of the now quite sound room.
"Hey old man, we need a bigger set of speakers," the teen said.
"Marcus, I told you those are the largest speakers that I have in stock at the moment," the owner said with a sigh. "If you want larger speakers you'll just have to wait till next week."
Silver shook his head as he walked off to look around a bit before pulling a nice looking electric base guitar down off the wall, a guitar that was seemingly placed out of reach of the teens in the sound proof room, who were all pouring out to find their friend.
"Looks like old man Jenkins has stiffed us again," the punky teen replied with a bit of and irritated sniff as he turned to his friends.
"Ah excellent choice sir," Jenkins said as he took the opertunity to turn away from Marcus and head over to speak with Silver. "Why don't you let me hook that up for you and see how it sounds..."
Jenkins continued to talk as he plugged the guitar into a set of speakers. He told Silver about the guitar, the manufacturer and any other tid bit of information whether or not Silver needed to know about or not he was told.
"Isn't that rich boys," Marcus said as he leaned up against the counter. "Some other old timer coming in to try out a guitar, I bet. All old man Jenkins gets anymore is geezers if it wasn't for us. Bet he can't even play."
* * * The soft thump of foot falls down the hallway would be all that was heard of Vivian as she continued her search for Star. She turned down another hallway and went up the stairs, down another hall and headed for the one place she felt certain that she would find Silver's sibling. The was a light shifting of fabric that could be seen at the end of the hall, the curtains covered the double doors to the balcony stirred slightly in a light breeze that must have started. The grey furred woman pulled the drapery aside and walked through the doors, there leaning against the rail was Star.
The black furred woman's ears twitched at the sound of footsteps thumping upon the wooden balcony. She turned her gaze from the streets below, to the woman behind her.
"Can I help you Viv?" Star asked as she shifted and turned to face the smaller woman.
"How are you doing, Star?" Vivian asked as she caught a glimpse of Silver's guitar resting next to the black furred mouse before her.
"All right I guess," Star replied before shaking her head with a light sigh, tarnished silver locks swayed softly with the motion of her head to tickle her ears as she leans back against the railing of the balcony, hands behind her before she bows her head.
"I know you're lieing, I know that you miss him but Star you can't keep up like this. I know that once you get moving you tend to keep moving, it's just not healthy to stay cooped up in the morning all the time. People are worried about you," Vivian said as she took a seat on a stool by the doors.
"I know Viv, I know, it's just," Star paused, "I don't know how to explain it, I have this feeling that something is going to happen and that it is not something that is going to be good and it has me really worried. The feeling has been growing stronger lately, bothering me in the early morning hours."
"Well I guess that it will have to be delt with when it comes, if it comes," Vivian said with a smile. "I think that it's just your nerves."
Star managed to laugh a bit. "Maybe your right," she said.
"Come on, there's a lot to do yet and the last thing that we're gonna need is to be far behind schedule when your brother gets home, he'll think that we were being lazy!" Vivian said in a good nature tone as she stood up.
Star shook her head and stood up, walking over to the shorter woman she gave Viv a hug. "Thanks, Viv," she said before leading the smaller woman back out of the house.
* * * Charley kept herself quite busy at the Last Chance between digging around for parts for the Bros motorcycles, to having to prepare the munchies, to just sitting around and talking it was going to be quite a full day.
"Haven't heard from ya in a bit sweetheart," Vinnie called to Charley over the sound of the radio and the sound of an air rachet. "What ya been up to?"
Charley couldn't help but laugh at Vinnie, "You saw me two days ago, Vinnie."
"Well.yeah," Vinnie said a odd look crossing his face. "But that's still along time if you know what I mean." The tall white martian mouse waggled his eyebrow at her causing Modo and Throttle to just groan.
Charley just rolled her eyes at Vinnie before walking into the kitchen area of the garage, only to return a few moments later with another steaming hot tray of hotdogs and ice cold rootbeer.
* * *
As soon as everything was ready, black furred fingers played over the strings of the guitar with ease as Silver made sure the instrument was in tune before striking up a fast paced tempo as he played a few, seemingly light metal cords. The group of punkish teens just blinked a few moments as they heard the song pour forth from the speakers.
"Man, he's better then I thought, who knew," Marcus said in a haughty way as the other boys just ignored him, letting Marcus nurse his bruised ego.
Silver would stay at the shop for a few good hours trying out a variety of different guitars and chatting with Jenkins. The group of punk teens would try to pick a variety of minor fights over which guitar was better, trying to drag Jenkins into them most of the time before the tall martian man left.
* * *
Silver would arrive back at the Last Chance not long after the Bros had left, Charley was sitting with her feet propped up in the chair that she has been sleeping in for the past few days. Glad to have the Garage in one somewhat clean state for the evening.
"You look exausted, Miss Charlene," Silver said as he came inside after talking one look at he woman. "Sorry that I have returned so late, I was," he paused a moment. "Distracted by music store."
"Don't worry about it," Charley said as she tried to stifle a yawn.
The conversation would end up going to be a slight argument on who is sleeping where with Charley ending the winner, for she wasn't going to take no for an answer from anyone.
* * *
Back at the scoreboard Vinnie was all in an uproar that was nearly driving Throttle and Modo crazy.
"I can't believe it I forgot my lucky red scarf!" Vinnie nearly shouted for probably the hundreth time since they got back. "I'm gonna go get it right now."
"Come on Vinnie my man you can get it tomorrow, I'm sure that Charley girl is sleepin' and I don't think that you should be goin' over there to wake the lady up just over your scarf," Modo replied as he dutifully stepped into Vinnie's way.
"But.." Vinnie started.
"Vincent," Throttle said though slightly clenched teeth as he pulled the glasses down a bit, as he was sick and tired of heard about the white martian's lucky red scarf. "I don't want to have to tell you again that it can wait till morning."
Vinnie just sighed, "All right."
* * *
There sitting on Charley's desk, folded up all nice and pristine was Vinnie's lucky red scarf. Soon to be lost in the darkness of the Garage as the lights were turned off for the evening.
By Drifter Song
July 10 , 2002
Copyright Drifter Song 2000-2002, all rights reserved.
Silver was quite impressed with how easily he was able to handle Charley's motorcycle given the difference in size between the woman and himself. He found the ride to be comfortable even though he was nearly doubled over while he rode. He had to guess that it would be sometime after mid- afternoon, here on Earth, he almost wondered what it was like back on Mars, but he shook thoughts of home from his mind.
* * *
The sun was just starting to rise and spread its warmth over the red sands of Mars, not much was stirring at sunrise, at least not visibly. A small form made her way across the city that was waking slowly with the rising sun. She sighed, she hated this morning routine, really hated it. She stopped before a door of one of the houses and found Thor standing there.
"Is she not up yet?" the woman asked the much taller chestnut mouse, her voice was a bit on the husky side for one so small.
"I'm afraid not Vivian," Thor said in a soft yet resonating tone as he looked over his shoulder at the door behind him.
"Oye, what are we going to do with her," Vivian replied as she ran her a smoky grey hand through her fiery red hair. "I can understand her worries, but.she has a job to do. We all do. Silver's a big boy, he can take care of himself."
Thor nodded before speaking. "You're right, my dear sister." He then chuckled at her comment about Silver before continuing. "There is much that has to be done and worrying about his Lordship will do nothing to sooth the nerves I'm afraid."
"Maybe it's time for girl talk, one sister to another," Viv replied as she placed her hands on her hips, her dark fur stood out in contrast to her pale blue sleeveless top and beige pants. "You know I'm really starting to dread waking up in the morning."
Thor nodded once again as he stepped to the side to let his sister pass. Viv may be nearly three foot shorter then himself but that didn't mean she couldn't hold her own against her much larger sibling. She knew were to hit him where it hurts.
Weaving her way through the house Vivian stopped at the bedroom door and knocked. The only thing that greeted her back was silence. A frown then crossed her dark grey muzzle as she knocked again, still receiving no reply.
"Star?" Vivian called as she tried the door and found it unlocked. Opening the door she peeked her head inside to find the bedroom empty. Her long grey tail twitched slightly in frustration. "Hmmmm."
She turned and headed towards a different hallway, hoping that Star would be at the end of it.
* * *
The traffic was picking up in the large city as Silver drew closer and closer to the more populated areas. Once he found a spot that was just large enough to park the bike he maneuvered it into the spot and turned it off. He then leaned back so that he could sit up at his full height and looked around through the tinted visor of his helmet. Pale blue eyes took in the surroundings with intense curiosity as he dismounted. He has never been to a city of this size on Mars, let alone Earth. Silver figured he was in just as good a place to start looking for the items on the list, he turned to walk down the street, heedless of the odd looks that he got for keeping his helmet on. His gaze drifted from window to window as he made his way down through the shopping district of Chicago.
* * *
"You all right there, Charley girl?" Vinnie asked as he drew closer to the woman, lofting a furred brow.
"Yeah.Vinnie, I'm fine why do you ask?" Charley said after a few moments of silence as her gaze traveled from one helmeted face to another.
"Are you sure about that Babe?" Throttle asked as he too moved towards Charley and entered the Last Chance.
"Yeah," Charley replied with a crooked grin as she gestured with her one hand. "Why wouldn't I be?"
Charley just hoped that none of the guys asked about what was under the drop cloth that hid Silver's ride. That and she also hoped that none of the motorcycles reacted to one another, she really didn't want to have to try and explain who it belonged to and why it was there. In truth she didn't know the answer to the second part and that could be a major problem.
* * *
Heavy footfalls clacked upon the paved walkway as Silver made his way through the shopping district. What might have started out to be a short shopping trip, pending Chicago traffic at rush hour and a small bit of exploring the surrounding area, would be delayed due to a minor distraction. A distraction that would probably be more helpful then it was hindering. That distraction was a music store, or more pointedly an instrument store, which he found on his way back to Charley's motorcycle.
Pausing Silver looked at the door, brows furrowed in thought as he really should get back to the Last Chance Garage as he shifted the paper bag into the crook of his right arm. Instead of walking past like he should have he entered the store only to be partially assaulted by a racket that caused his ears to ring, even the tip of his tail twitched almost spastically around his waist.
"I'm terribly sorry about that sir," a man said as he came rushing out of the back room, shutting the door behind him, causing the sound to die down till it was muffled with a click of the sound proof door. "How may I help you?"
"No need to apologize, good keeper," Silver replied smiling slightly behind the deep smoke tint of his visor before his gaze left the middle aged man to sweep around the store. "I'm not sure, good keeper, I stopped in to take a look around."
"Well then browse away." the store owner replied before being rudely interrupted by a punkish looking teenager that came out of the now quite sound room.
"Hey old man, we need a bigger set of speakers," the teen said.
"Marcus, I told you those are the largest speakers that I have in stock at the moment," the owner said with a sigh. "If you want larger speakers you'll just have to wait till next week."
Silver shook his head as he walked off to look around a bit before pulling a nice looking electric base guitar down off the wall, a guitar that was seemingly placed out of reach of the teens in the sound proof room, who were all pouring out to find their friend.
"Looks like old man Jenkins has stiffed us again," the punky teen replied with a bit of and irritated sniff as he turned to his friends.
"Ah excellent choice sir," Jenkins said as he took the opertunity to turn away from Marcus and head over to speak with Silver. "Why don't you let me hook that up for you and see how it sounds..."
Jenkins continued to talk as he plugged the guitar into a set of speakers. He told Silver about the guitar, the manufacturer and any other tid bit of information whether or not Silver needed to know about or not he was told.
"Isn't that rich boys," Marcus said as he leaned up against the counter. "Some other old timer coming in to try out a guitar, I bet. All old man Jenkins gets anymore is geezers if it wasn't for us. Bet he can't even play."
* * * The soft thump of foot falls down the hallway would be all that was heard of Vivian as she continued her search for Star. She turned down another hallway and went up the stairs, down another hall and headed for the one place she felt certain that she would find Silver's sibling. The was a light shifting of fabric that could be seen at the end of the hall, the curtains covered the double doors to the balcony stirred slightly in a light breeze that must have started. The grey furred woman pulled the drapery aside and walked through the doors, there leaning against the rail was Star.
The black furred woman's ears twitched at the sound of footsteps thumping upon the wooden balcony. She turned her gaze from the streets below, to the woman behind her.
"Can I help you Viv?" Star asked as she shifted and turned to face the smaller woman.
"How are you doing, Star?" Vivian asked as she caught a glimpse of Silver's guitar resting next to the black furred mouse before her.
"All right I guess," Star replied before shaking her head with a light sigh, tarnished silver locks swayed softly with the motion of her head to tickle her ears as she leans back against the railing of the balcony, hands behind her before she bows her head.
"I know you're lieing, I know that you miss him but Star you can't keep up like this. I know that once you get moving you tend to keep moving, it's just not healthy to stay cooped up in the morning all the time. People are worried about you," Vivian said as she took a seat on a stool by the doors.
"I know Viv, I know, it's just," Star paused, "I don't know how to explain it, I have this feeling that something is going to happen and that it is not something that is going to be good and it has me really worried. The feeling has been growing stronger lately, bothering me in the early morning hours."
"Well I guess that it will have to be delt with when it comes, if it comes," Vivian said with a smile. "I think that it's just your nerves."
Star managed to laugh a bit. "Maybe your right," she said.
"Come on, there's a lot to do yet and the last thing that we're gonna need is to be far behind schedule when your brother gets home, he'll think that we were being lazy!" Vivian said in a good nature tone as she stood up.
Star shook her head and stood up, walking over to the shorter woman she gave Viv a hug. "Thanks, Viv," she said before leading the smaller woman back out of the house.
* * * Charley kept herself quite busy at the Last Chance between digging around for parts for the Bros motorcycles, to having to prepare the munchies, to just sitting around and talking it was going to be quite a full day.
"Haven't heard from ya in a bit sweetheart," Vinnie called to Charley over the sound of the radio and the sound of an air rachet. "What ya been up to?"
Charley couldn't help but laugh at Vinnie, "You saw me two days ago, Vinnie."
"Well.yeah," Vinnie said a odd look crossing his face. "But that's still along time if you know what I mean." The tall white martian mouse waggled his eyebrow at her causing Modo and Throttle to just groan.
Charley just rolled her eyes at Vinnie before walking into the kitchen area of the garage, only to return a few moments later with another steaming hot tray of hotdogs and ice cold rootbeer.
* * *
As soon as everything was ready, black furred fingers played over the strings of the guitar with ease as Silver made sure the instrument was in tune before striking up a fast paced tempo as he played a few, seemingly light metal cords. The group of punkish teens just blinked a few moments as they heard the song pour forth from the speakers.
"Man, he's better then I thought, who knew," Marcus said in a haughty way as the other boys just ignored him, letting Marcus nurse his bruised ego.
Silver would stay at the shop for a few good hours trying out a variety of different guitars and chatting with Jenkins. The group of punk teens would try to pick a variety of minor fights over which guitar was better, trying to drag Jenkins into them most of the time before the tall martian man left.
* * *
Silver would arrive back at the Last Chance not long after the Bros had left, Charley was sitting with her feet propped up in the chair that she has been sleeping in for the past few days. Glad to have the Garage in one somewhat clean state for the evening.
"You look exausted, Miss Charlene," Silver said as he came inside after talking one look at he woman. "Sorry that I have returned so late, I was," he paused a moment. "Distracted by music store."
"Don't worry about it," Charley said as she tried to stifle a yawn.
The conversation would end up going to be a slight argument on who is sleeping where with Charley ending the winner, for she wasn't going to take no for an answer from anyone.
* * *
Back at the scoreboard Vinnie was all in an uproar that was nearly driving Throttle and Modo crazy.
"I can't believe it I forgot my lucky red scarf!" Vinnie nearly shouted for probably the hundreth time since they got back. "I'm gonna go get it right now."
"Come on Vinnie my man you can get it tomorrow, I'm sure that Charley girl is sleepin' and I don't think that you should be goin' over there to wake the lady up just over your scarf," Modo replied as he dutifully stepped into Vinnie's way.
"But.." Vinnie started.
"Vincent," Throttle said though slightly clenched teeth as he pulled the glasses down a bit, as he was sick and tired of heard about the white martian's lucky red scarf. "I don't want to have to tell you again that it can wait till morning."
Vinnie just sighed, "All right."
* * *
There sitting on Charley's desk, folded up all nice and pristine was Vinnie's lucky red scarf. Soon to be lost in the darkness of the Garage as the lights were turned off for the evening.