4. The mouse and its motivations.

A lex, less than successful in her attempts to rationalise the carnage to which she had born witness, fled. She made her way through the forest, far too cool and bright and green and above-all pleasant to have possibly played host to the bivouac of a few minutes before. She pushed past bushes and hopped the moss-covered stones of a shallow, silver-skinned brook, her feet moistened in the burbling streaks of creamy foam. And after continuing in this way for some time, Alex paused, for she heard something.

"Hello?" she said, uneasily. She could not shake the suspicion that it was one of the carnivores, following her.

There was no reply.

"Hello?" called Alex again. Her heart was ticking slightly too fast from fear.

There was a rustling noise from a copse of polygala before her. In the heart of the green oval leaves, something glinted. Alex braced herself, breath catching in throat.

"Of all the ways a young woman might die, to be hunted and consumed!" she thought. Several steps were taken until a trunk pressed itself against her back.

Another rustle.

The snap of a twig.

From out of the copse there leapt the white mouse, its eyes gleaming in the diffused sunlight and its teeth bared, showing yellow.

"You!" it barked. "You've followed me!"

"What do you mean?" said Alex, less afraid now that her enemy was quantified.

"You chased me," the mouse growled, "down through thi pessage ind down thi lift and along thi corridor o' iron. Ye've persued me and now ye wish to strike!"

"It's not true!" said Alex.

"So ye deny it?"

"Yes! I mean, no!"

The mouse advanced, drooling and with a feral countenance. It seemed to have gained several feet in length, and was the size of tall, fat Jack Russel. Its claws were polished ivory.

"Leave me be," it said.

"But I haven't been following you, perse," the girl stammered. "I mean, I followed you at first, for you were so curious, but once I was past the doors I'd quite forgotten about you!"

The mouse hissed. It wandered thrice in a circle. It resembled a possum ready to strike.

"Get to me 'ouse!" it snarled, "ind we'll sort this out."

Alex did not budge an inch.

"Go, or I'll gut ye!" The mouse raised a razor claw and pounced, chasing Alex a few meters through the trees. It left off after a moment, but Alex could still hear it calling after her. She stumbled on across the sward, and after a few moments came to a house.

It was a very ordinary house, a Queenslander to all appearances. A letterbox out the front had "E and Q Weissmause painted on it, and the Q had a ragged claw-mark straight through it. There was a parcel inside, which Alex promptly stole.

"Vicious rodent," she muttered. "Damned if I'll have no revenge."

With the parcel in her pocket, she climbed the steps to the front door. They were rotted and brittle, and stained all over with paint. The door, when she reached it, had three long gashes through the panelling, as though a tiger had been scratching to get in. It was unlocked, and she entered.

The light was dim through the thick curtains. It showed only the outlines of a worn vinyl couch and a linoleum coffee-table. A plant-pot in one corner had died.

Alex took a seat on the couch and waited. She waited for some time. She waited for slightly more. The mouse did not appear to be in any particular hurry. Bored, she tore-open the parcel at one end and had a look.

It was a wooden box, and inside of it was a small, unmarked vial. The fluid within was blue and reminded Alex of something. She unscrewed the top, and a small tendril of smoke wormed its way out. Eyes glittered within it, laughing.

"It seems very similar to the vial from before," she thought, "except that in this case it does not seem to be quite so virulent. I shall bear this in mind."

She put the vial in her shirt pocket, and the box in her trousers. The wrapping she stuffed down the back of the couch, and then she resumed waiting.

"This is very dull," she reflected, and decided to rummage. If the mouse returned, she would hear it.

There was nothing of interest in the loungeroom, but after a few blind corners a bedroom made itself apparent, and in this there was a cabinet and a chest of drawers. The first held only clothes and bots. Alex opened the second, and gasped.

There were dozens and dozens and dozens of vials such as the one in her pocket, and a stiletto besides. In the second drawer was a photo album, within which were several nauseating black-and-white images of shrews and voles in compromising positions.

"I know exactly what kind of animal this mouse is," said Alex, "and I am not entirely sure that I am still comfortable here."

She made-up her mind to leave, and went to the front door. As she did, she heard footsteps on the stairs.

"The mouse!"

Before she could think, she had shot the bolt on the door.

A few moments later, there knob rattled.

"What thi hell be this?" said the mouse. "Who's gone ind locked me door? Lassie, open it, lassie. Come now, I'll nay harm ye!"

The door rattled again, and Alex backed away. Unconsciously, her hand strayed to the vial in her pocket.

"Come now, lass," said the mouse. "I don't know what I've done to upset ye, but you can be assured I've no ill-feelings t'wards ye."

Alex remained.

"Now lass, ye're trying me patience. Open thi door!" The door shook as the fat little creature slammed into it. The hinges groaned.

"What do I do?" thought Alex. Her fingers twirled the vial.

"OPEN THI DOOR, LASS!" screamed the mouse. "Open it or I'll do more than KILL ye!"

"What do I do?" Legs took her to the mesh-covered windows as her fingers undid the cap.

"NOW, lass!"

A mechanical click through the wood.

Alex gasped, and almost choked. The blue fluid burnt its way down her throat as she asked herself why she had drunk it. All questions faded as ice wrapped around her. The world grew more and more definite as she faded into spectral hues. The door exploded of its hinges and the mouse loomed all around as Alex lost her form and formed a being in name alone. She had no hands to hold-out, no feet to walk with, and yet she could walk and grasp. With one belt of her distorted limbs she felled the mouse, and with another robbed it of its pistol. She passed through the door in a whisper of air, and fled into the garden.

A lizard with a machete stood at the foot of the stairs, smoking a dog-end. Alex snatched it from him, and the lizard gasped and rattled its pebbly frill. At its cry two guinea pigs appeared from where (presumably) they had been guarding the backdoor. Their eyes were fogged and they were toting cricket-bats wrapped-around with barbed-wire.

"That sick freak," she thought. "Paranoid addict."

She blew-off down the road, into the trees, deferring her revenge because her body was rapidly coalescing around her.

The experience of having her body reform was quite disturbing for Alex. It moulded itself around an invisible framework, taking shape in shades of blue that were slowly joined by yellows and reds and blacks and whites until all of her colours were in appearance and she was entirely opaque. It felt like nothing so much as standing naked and damp in a cool breeze.

When Alex was all there, and certain that nobody was following her, she kept-on through the forest. Quite wisely, she avoided the road.

There was nothing of any note to see beneath the trees. Alex, who was no stranger to foliage, remarked on this or that, but after a time she began to wonder where exactly she was going. She wondered this especially for she was certain that she could smell something. It was a dirty, musky, musty scent, and it was coming from behind her.

She turned-around, and baulked.

A wolf was standing there.

"Hello," said Alex.

"Hello," growled the wolf.

"I don't suppose that you're a friendly wolf, are you?" asked Alex.

"As friendly as any wolf can be."

Alex relaxed with a sigh.

"Of course, no wolf can ever be friendly, unless it is full."

"Are you full?" asked Alex.

"Not as such," said the wolf. "I am, in fact, quite famished."

The long, thick tongue lolled.

Alex ran.

She ran as fast as she could, across the ground between the boles over the moss under boughs by the brook and through a gully. She ran so fast that she seemed to stand sill, and the world turned away beneath her. Everything faded and became blurry around the edges.

"Wolves run faster than humans," said the wolf. It was pacing her easily, and its tongue still lolled.

"The mouse is seeking you," it said. "You escaped it. I am hungry, and so shall aid it."

Alex recalled something with a start, froze, and turned. The barrel gleamed in the sunlight. The pistol and the wolf both barked. The pistol barked louder.

Blood pooled around Alex's feet, and she felt ill. She looked at the wolf, its eyes suddenly glass, its fur suddenly cotton. Then she stoped, and stroked it.

She started.

The wolf's eyes were glass, and its fur was cotton. Its tongue was velvet, and its teeth were porcelain. It was only a stuffed dog, albeit one with excellent stitching and a well-stuffed body.

"That was odd," said Alex. She calmed, knowing it was only a toy, then became frightened, wondering how a toy could pursue her. She left, and practiced the principle of out of sight, out of mind.

After a little while she grew tired. She was exhausted. She blamed this principally upon her super-human run. Looking around for somewhere concealed to rest, she saw a mushroom, and began to pull herself up.

The caterpillar atop it leant down, its faceted eyes gleaming, took one long pull of its cigarette, and then exhaled the caustic smoke across Alex's face.