Outside of Salt Lake City, Melpomene, Mouthbreather and I had watched a massive thunderhead approach, glints of lightning touching ground in the distance. As it approached, it swallowed the sun, the sky, and blasted us with wind, rain and then hailstones. Then it was gone. The desert wrens reappeared, and the sun glinted on standing pools of water. So it was in Cupertino - the war was over.
Time to assess, once more.
Thalia was looking after my filly, sending healing strength into her broken body. I helped her for a moment, then I went to tend to HippyChick.
On my way I saw Melpomene nursing MouthBreather back to health. I heard her say, “If you don’t stop wiggling, Jake, I swear I will give you a lava enema.” MouthBreather was re-telling the battle, playing up his heroics, but I think he just wanted Melpomene to respect him. I don’t know what Melpomene is looking for, but I’m damned sure it isn’t a testosterone-soaked prick.
When Melpomene noticed me standing there, she said “They didn’t have tails, remember? The cowardly lion had to hide his tail. So they couldn’t have been flying monkeys.”
“Maybe they were apes. Apes don’t have tails.” I said. I scarcely remembered what she was talking about, but I guess she knew I was screwing with her. But she had already turned back to MouthBreather. I moved on.
I found HippyChick lying in the back seat of her pickup truck, in a bad state.
“The bastard bought the farm, then?” She coughed up some blood. “Thank you, Zenia.”
“It is you who I thank. You have honored your mother, and your friends.”
“I want you to bury me under the willow tree by the wash, at my ranch. Not the cottonwood, the willow, facing the shrine to Kuan Shi Yin.” She closed her eyes and lay still. Her friends were pinned to the earth in despair, weeping.
I laughed. “It would prove too difficult for me to bury you - you have too much of Gaia’s fire in you to be buried without a struggle. Let us rather repair what is broken.” I poured out every dram of healing I could muster, mending bones, ligaments and the intricate net of capillaries weaving through her body.
When I was done, I kissed her forehead, and let her rest.