#6000k

Marianna was sitting on the curb outside of Steinhaur’s diner, the only place in Chicago she felt like being at right now when Hall came up walking out from his pickup truck that he parked somewhere behind her. Silently, and infuriatingly watching her as she smoked down her cigarette to the filter. She had just spent thirteen hours with the man in that rusted old Ford and was still unhappy to see him.

It was the coldest day in Autumn for Chicago on record, at least in the last six years that she could recall. She could see the electronic thermometer posted underneath a bank sign which happened to be directly across from the diner, still reading a cool twenty degrees Fahrenheit since the moment she sat down.

God only knew why this hellhole was staying so frozen months before winter.

Marianna worked as an army nurse and had been doing so for the last six years, which meant as of recently, her time was up in the military. She swore on her life, hand on the Bible that she would give her country seventy-two consecutive months of her life. Mainly, to administer penicillin shots and look at deformed genitalia at the base's military hospital.

But, she gave it regardless. Now, her time was up. She could have ripped her military contract up and traveled home in that instance. Giving the military the huge middle finger on the way out for all the grief she faced for the last seventy-two months. But, she lingered, for whatever ungodly reason she didn’t know.

Maybe it was the way the higher-ups or even the way Hall had coaxed her to think differently. To stay in the military, join the reserves, finish her education, and ‘come back better than ever!’. It wasn’t what most did. It wasn’t even brought up as an option to most people. People who were not interested in the fight for their country and leaning more on the healing side were just not as valued. At least, not in her experience.

“You never know,” Hall had told her with a knowing smile, “You could get a promotion one day!”

But, she already moved up in the ranks before. Straight from second lieutenant to first after she graduated nursing school, then remaining stagnant for the rest of those six years. She didn’t think she could move any further. Perhaps, that’s why she agreed. Wanting to achieve that little twenty-one-year-old’s dream of reaching Captain, or maybe even Major. That was the odd thing about moving up in the ranks, you didn’t get much from it. Perhaps a raise in pay, and a little respect. But, you still wanted it all the same. Mari had wanted that at one point, too.

But, unlike Lieutenant Colonel James Hall. Who was one of her base’s licensed nurses, her nursing professor, and above all, her superior. Whether or not Marianna wanted what he had was still up in the air. Marianna very much identified herself as a drifter and enjoyed being moved from place to place depending on her deployment. Climbing up the ranks meant stability, and having to stay and chip away at the mountains of red tape that a higher rank demanded didn’t seem like her speed. Now, Mari had already decided that Hall could keep all that responsibility to himself. Marianna, on the other hand, enjoyed going back to her bed at a cool seven AM after a full shift wherever she was sent. And not having to stay in one place for more than a year or two.

But, she still agreed to join the reserves despite it all.

She realized, somewhere at least, that she should be happy that she could avoid deployment for the first time in six years. That she could get off of active duty. That she served her respective time. She should have been thrilled. She could stay home, sleep in her bed, wash up in her shower.

Be with her family.

Marianna cringed back into her neck at the thought, taking one of the five empty cans of soda she was collecting as ammo and hurled it at the fat, plump-bellied vermin as it tried to cross over her feet again. She had been hurling cans at the little creatures for the past fifteen minutes as they ran back and forth on the empty street, occasionally running over her boots and bringing out an uncharacteristic amount of fear in Marianna. She watched as the little rat gave a pathetic squeak as the can banked off its chunky body and ricocheted away to be carried off by the harsh autumn wind. It looked back at her with offending, rabid eyes before it scurried away.

That was the one part of Chicago she hated. Or any big city for that matter. The rats. Rodents, specifically, were one of those creatures that Marianna had no trouble hating with their small, unblinking eyes and round bodies jumping with lice and all assortments of diseases. Normally, she wouldn’t show her cruelty for another life so willingly in front of another person. But, this time Hall had caught her like the sneaky sonuvabitch he was.

“What are you doing, Mari?”

“The rats,” She answered, realizing how lame she must have sounded when all the rats now had scurried away from her warpath moments ago, all beyond the last brave one she chucked at. “They kept touching my feet.”

Hall nodded once, briefly. He was a behemoth of a man, large and beefy with a blond buzz cut right down to the scalp. His eyes were a tired, graying blue, speckled with age and deep fine lines from his many decades in the service. He was out of his fatigues now, she noticed and wore a crisp white button-up with the sleeves rolled up to his forearms, which contradicted with his rough and torn denim jeans. He looked at her closely, “You shouldn’t be doing that, you know. Those things bite.”

“I was throwing shit at them so that they wouldn’t bite me.” She answered, blandly.

Hall nodded as if the topic no longer interested him.

“I can tell you’re avoiding going in.” He said, tilting his head at the entrance of the diner before returning his gaze to her.

She didn’t answer him, just mindlessly twirled an empty can of soda in her hands as she waited for more rats to appear. Until she felt a sudden sharp poke on her left shoulder, forcing her to look back at him. Hall was pushing a small box of menthols into her shoulder with an easy smile. “You can’t avoid her forever.”

“She’s not even in there.” She said, waving a hand in the direction of the near-empty parking lot. Showcasing only three motorcycles and his pickup truck in the minimal spaces. Like this would have been enough to prove her point.

“But she’s going to be. You said so yourself, best to get the drop on her in a public space than just showing up at her home.”

Marianna grunted. Understanding that she did indeed say that and still believed it was a better idea than barging in her sister’s home, metaphorical hat in hand, and on her knees in forgiveness. She knew people had to do embarrassing, and sometimes rude things to be forgiven. But, a line had to be drawn somewhere.

Coldly, she gently took the menthols from his hand and began unwrapping the protective plastic. Reaching for her lighter in her jacket pocket with a fresh cigarette fitting neatly between her lips. Marianna had already changed out of her uniform fourteen hours ago. Opting to wear her faded tight blue jeans, under an army green tee-shirt that read “Army Nurse.” Her father’s worn leather jacket wrapped snugly around her form. Letting her red hair drape down her back to produce some well-needed heat to her neck.

She wanted to look like herself for her sister. Instead of the soon-to-be-nurse dreaming of saving all the heroes six years ago. That person didn’t even exist to Mari anymore.

Initially, she had been planning to take a bus or a plane from New York to Chicago. Hall, stopping her before she could even consider buying a bus ticket, already planned on going to Chicago for his annual trip to see his son. But, she knew his real reason for insisting he take her. He knew her history, knew she would take any reason to chicken out about going home.

“Your contract is up,” He had said to her, holding her luggage in one hand before tossing it into the back of his truck. “And your new one for the reserves doesn’t start for another two months. I’ll take you. It’s on the way. It’s cheaper.”

She still had no idea why she agreed. Only choosing to do everything on a whim before she changed her mind. The need to see her sister, her family, was so immense that she didn’t even bother to let the fact that she wouldn’t want to see Mari begin to cloud her judgment.

Now, she didn’t want to move, regret gluing her boots firmly to the payment. And instead of looking back at Hall, she looked over at Steinhaur’s parking lot again. Fixing on the same spot as she had been the whole time she was here.

Only six places were put side by side at the curb of the diner, and on any given day only three of four were used when she lived here. Even in the farthest recesses of her childhood, this place was never busy. Still wasn’t even now. Today, only three places were used with three motorcycles in the limited space beyond Hall’s truck. Marianna had been watching the bikes, waiting for the owners of the bikes to come out for a long while. Mainly, to ask them questions on their models and makes. But, when they never came out she just opted for just staring at them.

Two out of the three were packed into one space together. Modern and sleek in design. One was cherry red, perhaps a Suzuki series, she surmised. Made to be a sports vehicle to be admired and looked upon. The other was a dark blue motorcycle of what she believed to be a Honda Valkyrie. A true beast of a motorcycle with a monstrous amount of horsepower and purr in its engine.

The last bike, sitting alone in a single space beside its beautiful brothers, had Marianna salivating with envy. A brand new Daytona Harley-Davidson. Black, sleek, slim, and with bright shades of silver in its chrome trim.

If she remembered correctly, only 1,700 of those babies were produced. What she wouldn’t give to jump into its seat and take it for a spin.

Marianna used to work on bikes, cars, and vehicles of all sorts. Motorbikes are one of her favorites. She tinkered with them, played with them, and even blew one up in her father’s garage once when she was a teenager. She was never as proficient as her sister probably is now as an auto body mechanic, but she knew how to work a motorbike and how to make it work for her. It was the one thing she had pride in.

But, she noticed, the bikes had no logos, no insignia, no brand markings of any kind. Just smooth paint where the mark should be. And while she remarked that this wasn’t out of the ordinary. Even some of her old clients made specific remarks that they wanted old brand markings rubbed out, pulled off, and recovered with a new coat of paint. But, most wanted that status symbol. For people to see their brand new Honda or Harley-Davidson. It was an ego thing if nothing else.

Additionally, the designs were off in the small details of the bikes. As if the bikes were built lovingly by skilled hands from the ground up. Pieces were mix-matched, bending in weird shapes she didn’t recognize for particular bike parts, and above all, an odd shape was given to each of the bike's headlights.

They were shaped exactly like a mouse head. Round faces with rounded ears on each side. Or, at least as round as forging metal could provide. Which ended up giving the mouse heads a bit more of an angular shape.

A gang symbol, perhaps? She wasn’t sure, it had been so long since she had been involved with Chicago’s darker underbelly.

Marianna took a deep, final drag of her cigarette, mashed it out on the curb, and turned to look at Hall. He was leaning against the wall of the diner now, directly beside the entrance. His arms crossed, with that ensuring and relaxed look in his gaze. Waiting for her.

Grimacing, she got up, freezing, and strode over to him. Called him an asshole one more time, and opened the front door.

The first thing she noticed when she opened the door, is that she was right. Her sister was indeed not there, or at least, not yet. But, she knew the room; had known it all her life. It was rectangular, the walls a creamy white, and decorated with small black and white photographs. A counter ran the length of over half of the entire room near its center and was decorated with old-fashioned cushioned stools. On each side of the room was a table with decorated red and blue cushioning. Above her blue fluorescent lights flickered, carrying the dead and long-gone corpses of flies in their casings.

Not a single thing about this place had changed since the 50s, and that brought on a sense of comfort for Marianna.

In the back, through the kitchen window, she could see the head of Mr. Steinhaur. Still as tall and as lanky as she remembered, he lowered his head at whatever task he had at hand. She couldn’t see him, not fully from her angle, but could still see the wisps of white hair peaking out from his soda jerk hat, and that tanned patch of skin on his forehead; but she still smiled at him, at that small mental image she was exposed to. She knew he would still look like that old, jolly man that she remembered from her childhood and it had effectively cooled at what anxiety she felt.

Then she looked over at the three figures at the end of the counter closest to the kitchen window.

Good God, that is a lot of hair.

It was three men, or what she supposed were men. Each sits side by side at the far left side of the bar. They were young, maybe even Marianna’s age, but it was impossible to tell with all that hair in the way.

Two out of the three of them were ideally chatting to one another with loud and booming voices. One sitting calmly with his hand wrapped around a beer stein, the foam of it dripping off the sides and lazily onto his hand. Which was also covered in an unrealistic amount of fur.

The younger one, which Marianna decided solely based on his young, almost chubby face beneath the mounds of stark white fur. On his right side he appeared to have a metallic, chrome mask covering the entirety of his right eye and cheek. He was shirtless, beyond a pair of green bandoleers crossing over his broad chest. He was the instigator of his friend’s conversation. Waving his hands in an exaggerated motion, constantly moving, and speaking.

His companion, the Goliath of a man, had been listening quietly to his buddy’s rantings. A quiet and blissful smile on his gentle, gray features. His face was harder than the smaller ones. Filled with jagged and angular lines underneath the fat of his mousy cheeks. His face was partially taken out of view by a black eyepatch on his left eye. He was shirtless as well, beyond hard armor plates across his chest and strong shoulders.

As he listened to the younger one chat away he pawed at his right arm mindlessly with his other hand. It was bulky, sleek, robotic even. A prose hic that moved freely with unconscious movements as if it were his good arm.

Her gaze fell on the last of the trio. At the very end of the table sat the last man, sipping mindlessly at his overfilled glass and staring out into the diner. Regardless of the diner being empty beyond the five of them. His features were softer than the rest of his group, thoughtful, and pensive. His face looked soft, cushioned with shaggy, sand-colored fur that fell over his obscured eyes. Like the others, his face was shrouded in one way or the other. But both his eyes were covered by green-tinted shades that hid any color or movement he could give off. Again, he was shirtless, but he seemed to be the most covered of his comrades. Having a black vest covered over almost the entirety of his midsection and a cherry-red bandanna wrapped around his thick neck. A furry, rounded ear had perked up every once in a while when the conversation of his friends had hit a crescendo. Beyond this, he didn’t move, only looked out like he was observing the world through the eyes of Earth’s only outsider.

She eyed them, vastly aware of how her jaw hung open as if the hinges of an old door were loosened. Unable to close fully even if she tried. And how a cool sweat was starting to form across her forehead and the middle of her back.

Muscular, tall, covered head to toe in fur, round ears pierced by studs, protruding snouts, small black noses, large buck teeth, and swinging large, slender tails from behind their chairs. And shirtless. Why in the world were they shirtless?

They looked like mice. Gigantic, overgrown, rats.

She noticed then, that the blond one turned his head slightly to her. Her stomach lurched and she wondered if he was looking at Hall or her until he reached a hand up and pulled his green shades down to the bridge of his nose.

He was eying her with a curious, interested gaze. But, somehow, with eyes that she knew he wasn’t seeing her with. And she was too focused on how his eyes were a dark, ruby red. He winked and her body decided to make her hair simultaneously stand on end as well as pushing blood to her frost-bitten cheeks in a furious blush.

Then as soon as he pulled his shades down, they were back up on the bridge of his nose and hiding his eyes. Like nothing had just transpired between them.

Hall’s booming chuckle pulled her out of her stupor, along with a sharp elbow to her side. He was standing behind her, she realized, smiling with mirth at the three furred men at the bar.

“Ha! Hey look, Davidson! Halloween came early this year!” He chuckled, rounding her frozen form to walk to the bar and sit right beside the three men. “Come on, Mari. I’m starving.”

She looked at him with as much equal horror as she did with three mice just a second ago, and then felt that horror mix in with an unbridled amount of fury when she saw him walk up to the blond mouse, sit two seats away from him, and give him a generous wave.

“Howdy! You fellas sure do love the Halloween season. Love that for you! Mind if I sit? I always tell myself that sitting at the bar was meant for strangers looking for friends. I’m James, you can call me Jim.”

Mari watched Hall go on. Watched the three men smile politely at him, and chat with him idly. She watched him, feeling hot betrayal at his inability to read a room, to read her, and his insistent need to make friends with everyone he meets; then thinking one single thought over and over in her mind like a broken record.

I’m going to kill him. I’m gonna paint the ceiling with his gray matter, then do the same to myself. What the absolute fuck?!

Then another thought came rolling in as if to save her from her upcoming murder charge.

Halloween. Yes, that’s right. It’s the middle of October. She thought, letting the smallest amount of relief wash over her. That would explain the weapons, the biker boots, the armor, and even the lack of proper autumn clothes. These gentlemen must have been heading to an early Halloween party. Even the red antennae, that Marianna had just noticed was protruding out from the tops of their fluffy heads, was all a part of some elaborate alien costume.

Or, something for a Star Trek convention in town.

She mashed down what was left of her horror and made her way to him, wordlessly moving her legs to make contact with the seat to his left; a good and healthy barrier between her and the personifications of her murophobia. She relaxed, until she suddenly felt Hall’s strong hand on her arm, giving an exaggerated pull and then throwing towards his opposite side before she could sit down. She felt herself tumble and fall gracelessly into a seat. Unaware of where she had landed because her vision was currently lighting up with the short burst of pain in her chest. She had fallen ribs first into the surface of the bar.

She groaned. Blinking the pain away and simultaneously straightening herself in her seat to sit more comfortably. When her vision steadied, she was already looking up at him. His face softened to an apologetic smirk, but still one filled with jovial good humor.

“Sorry Davidson, didn’t meet to chorale you into the table like that.” He said, then turning his apologetic grin to the person behind her. “She’s so bad at talking to people. You’d think she wouldn’t be, being a nurse and all—that’s what we are, by the way. But, she’s terrible at talking to anyone that she doesn’t have an IV in!”

He was still babbling when she turned around to look at who he was talking to. Knowing she didn’t have to look. She knew who he chose to sit close to.

All three of them were staring fixedly at her when she turned. Sometimes switching their gazes to look up at Hall as he spoke to them and gave polite nods of understanding. Specifically, more from the gray and blond ones; but more often than not, choosing to look back at her with their feral red eyes. Their rounded ears twitched, and large slender tails moved around their backs as freely as wild snakes. Looking at her as if she was the strange one.

Could I blame them? Hall did toss me into this seat like a professional wrestler.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” Hall shouted suddenly, placing a gentle hand on Mari’s shoulder and fanatically waving his hand in her direction, almost as if he was presenting a new car on the lot to welcome buyers. “This is Marianna Davidson, First Lieutenant of the United States Military. My subordinate.”

Mari scowled, shrugging off his touch. The last thing she needed was to be formally introduced to the objects of her irrational fear. Let alone be introduced as someone’s subordinate.

As far back as Mari could remember, she was afraid of rats, mice, and all rodents of any kind. There was something about their twitching pink noses, black marble eyes, and the way they would scurry across her feet in her bedroom at night.

She particularly hated the way they would squeal. Their tiny little bodies getting trapped in the nooks and crannies of piling garbage or too-narrow walls, and squealing their little lungs out with every death-fearing twitch they had in them.

She would keep her fear relatively bottled up. Usually, preferring to throw things at them from a distance, or keeping out glue traps and rat poison until the problem sorted itself out. It was easy to deal with, and easy to ignore. How often did a person who constantly had to travel and had a compulsion to keep everything neat have to deal with rodents?

Very slim to fuckin’ none, until I came here.

More and more she was realizing that coming back to Chicago was a mistake. First, she was dealing with her childhood phobia in the form of muscular nerds dressed as—

—Biker—alien—mice?

She breathed trying to cool the anxiety that was seeming to rise and fall in weird intervals in her. Knowing that her mind and her body were in a weird fight between logic and illogical fear. Creating a swirl of punching, fighting, clawing chaos that begged and screamed for her to run. But, also, kept her firmly seated on her cushioned chair. Her pride wouldn’t let her run from perfectly nice strangers. Even if their costumes were a little too realistic.

“Say hi, Mari.” Hall had said behind her.

Mari blinked, realizing that she was still looking up at the furred-nerd-mice-men. She hadn’t moved, perhaps hadn’t even had the opportunity to blink. She was simply looking up at their gigantic forms without even a sound leaving her mouth.

Then realizing she had spent a lot longer than a normal amount of time to summon the courage to speak, she choked out a shallow: “Hi. I’m Mari, like he said. Nice to—meet you.”

She paused, then looked over her shoulder to meet Hall’s gaze again for his assistance. “Misters?” She drawled out.

The white one chuckled first, his voice sounding light, and playful, “Misters? We’re the baddest mamajamas on this side of the universe, sweetheart.”

Oh, this is a bit. This is definitely a bit. “And that means—what?”

The gray one rolled his singular red eye and looked down at his smaller friend, exasperated. “Didn’t your mama ever teach you not to tease a lady?” Before that eye fell on her, and he smiled with the full of his crooked teeth.

“I’m Modo,” he said pointing a thumb at himself, then at his friend. “That’s Vinnie, don’t mind him Mari-ma’am.”

He said that last part soothingly. Stringing the words of her name and ‘ma’am’ like the words belonged together. If his face and blood-red eye weren’t so jarring, she would have found his low voice, and sweet tone endearing.

Then Modo waved a hand in the direction of the silent blond mouse, who was still looking at her. His face was stoic and still as stone, but holding a smile that was gentle and polite. “This is Throttle.”

Throttle nodded slightly in acknowledgment. The free hand not holding his half-drank stein was out in front of her. Furry fingers straight, palm open, waiting.

Mari swallowed thickly, mashing down her nerves and forcing a slight smile to pull at the corners of her mouth. It’s just a costume. It’s just a guy in a costume. A nice, weird, guy in a muscle man costume.

She reached out, and grabbed his hand, giving a firm but polite shake. Just like the military had taught her. Ignoring the way her skin immediately tingled from the contact, and how the contrast of his soft hair and the leather of his fingerless gloves made chills shoot down her spine in a rush of electricity.

“Nice to meet you, too.” He said. His voice carrying a calming, deep lithe to it.

Her stomach lurched, and she was almost ninety percent certain it was still a mixture of disgust and fear still holding a choke-hold on her body. But the other ten percent wasn’t sure, because a smile still pulled at her cheeks without her forcing it to stay.

They stayed like that for a long singular beat of a moment. Before he released his hand from hers and retrieved it to lay limply at his thigh. She only had a second to realize the contact was gone before she looked up and realized that his red antenna bounced slightly without the help or movement of his head.

Without helping it, she raised herself to sit taller and peak at the moving, bobbing protrusions.

I might as well ask them about the process of—whatever this is.

“How are you doing that?”

“Huh?”

“That thing you're doing with those antennae on your head.”

Through his specs, just barely, she saw his eyes dart from her to his friends. Who had now fully stopped their conversation to meet his gaze.

“I move it.” He said, chucking, and giving a slight wiggle to each protruding red thing.

“Well, no, I can see that. I mean, how are you making it move? Is it robotics? Are ya just bobbing your head?” She went on, leaning her elbow against the table to give a curious eye to the odd projections of his mascot head. When he made no motion to move away, but instead leaning in for her, she decided to give an experimental poke to one.

She realized then that it didn’t look as flimsy as she initially thought it did. Specifically when the little thing didn’t move or simply fell off his head from the slight weight of her finger.

Alarmed, but satisfied, she pulled her hand back, trying to graze over the fact that she touched that thing on him.

“I mean, I appreciate you committing to whatever it is you’re doing. It’s a very intricate bit to your costume.”

“Costume?” She heard them echo in mumbling tones. Even catching the attention of Hall as he also leaned forward to look at them past Mari’s shoulder.

“What are you dressed as, anyway? If you don’t mind me asking. It’s been a long time since I was involved in the sci-fi nerd scene. Haven’t done that since the 80’s. I get the mice part, I can see that, but the biker part is losing me. Are you biker—aliens, maybe?”

“Hey!” Vinnie suddenly gasped, pushing up from his seat to reveal that he had a good few inches on her. She pushed back the urge to fearfully jump, and waited, “I don’t know if you heard me the first time, or who you think we are, but nerds are far from it. We are, again, the baddest mamajamas on this side of the galaxy, sweetheart!”

She studied him at that moment, letting him glower at her playfully with those feral little red eyes. Then choosing to turn her smile up at him, trying to come across as cool and straight as Hall had been ever since he sat down. She fluttered her eyes and cooed up at him in mock appreciation, “Okay, I can play for you. I’m sure you are the most skilled and bodacious biker this side of the Milky Way.”

The young mouse-men’s eyes changed then. Carrying an air of teasing confidence, then swiftly transitioning to a surprised bashfulness.

She wondered briefly if his overconfident facade was his normal behavior. And if anyone ever agreed with his outrageous claims of grandeur.

She decided to push just a little further. Just to play. Just to tease. Just to make this whole situation less weird. “Did I mention smarts, too? I saw those bikes out there. I assume at least one of those is your handiwork.”

“Yeah, well, I—”

“Not to mention charm.”

“Ah, you—”

“And your sheer attractiveness. Has anyone ever told you how dreamy you are?”

“Sweet—”

“And that voice! Ugh, I’d pay you to read the phone book to me.”

His face was red then, painting the stark white fur of his mascot mask in a brilliant crimson. What a neat trick. She thought.

She noticed he was trying to stutter out. Perhaps a shy request for her to stop or maybe another snappy comeback for her sudden onslaught of casual flirting. She looked back at his friends. Cheeky grins took over their faces over the whole embarrassing display

“So, what are you, again?”

Her mind, admittedly, ran through the possibilities. Mostly sci-if dorks committing their entire being to small-time characters in some show that couldn’t even begin to understand.

What else could it be?

Throttle just shrugged his shoulders. “We’re mice, ma’am. Mice.” He annunciated the last word like this claim had made all the sense in the world, and explaining any further would have been a waste of his time.

“You were expecting turtles, maybe?” Modo added, chucking.

“Okay—” Mari paused, narrowing her eyes at them. “That makes absolutely no sense.”

“This part is always so hard to get through to people. I swear.” Vinnie said, evidently recovered from Mari’s display of affection.

Mari looked back at Hall, an expression of ‘what joke am I not getting here?’ falling on her face. Instead of an explanation, he patted Mari’s shoulder and shrugged good-heartedly at them. “Alright, keep your secrets.”

“Anyway, Mari,” Hall said, pulling her attention back to him. “I was about to ask our new friends here if they saw your sister in today. They’re regulars.”

“Oh.” She said, simply. Then looking back at them to eye them carefully. “Are you from here? Where did you go to school?”

Their faces suddenly fell one by one, making, something akin to a deep sadness shadowing their chubby faces.

“I—” She began, her skin prickling with that same anxiety that had gripped her when she first walked in and saw them. Immediately she had said the wrong thing. Even without knowing fully what she said to upset them.

I just asked them where they went to school.

“We’re—not from here.” Throttle said, “Chi-town is more of our home away from home.”

“Oh. I see.” She said, then added as if it was to recover from whatever rudeness she had forced to change the air between them. “So, my sister?”

“What’s your sister look like?”

She paused, thinking, then made a vague gesture with her hand as she imagined her sister as close as she could get. “Looks a little like me. But, her eyes are green, and her hair is more brunette-red. Tall, slim, takes no shit. She’s a mechanic here in town, she must have worked on your bikes at least once. You would know if you met her.”

Vinnie blinked, then looked over at his friends before he chose to look back at her. a look of deep concentration crossing over his face. “What did you say your last name was?”

“Davidson. Why? You think you know her?”

Vinnie and Modo didn’t move, not looking at her. But she saw Throttle give the briefest of nods. “Would her name be—?”

“Charley!” Marianna heard a voice say from the kitchen. She turned. Seeing Mr. Steinhaur’s top half of his body peek out from the kitchen window. Perhaps, leaning on his toes to fully get his head out. “I thought that was you I heard. I’m almost done with the boys—”

He stopped, his eyes finally focusing on her. She heard him swallow from here, “Marianna?”

She smiled, giving a small shy wave from across the bar. “Hi. Mr. Steinerhaur.”

“I—hold on a minute. Stay right there!” He shouted, his head dipping back out of the window.

Suddenly, she could hear the rattle of plates and silverware as they knocked together. The next thing she heard was the kick of a rubber shoe hitting against the kitchen door, Sending it flapping open wildly, and Mr. Steinhaur to come running out of it. Two trays of food were in his hands.

She barely noticed that he had placed the plates of chili hotdogs, and fries in front of her new, alien-looking friends before he was leaning against the bar and yanking her shoulders into a tight hug. She yelped, feeling the sharpness of his chin, and his top ribs, digging into her painfully.

“Sorry, sorry!” He said, loosening his grip. But, not letting go. “I just got so excited! You haven’t been to Chicago in six years!”

“Yeah.” She said, apologetically. Then giving him a gentle pat on his back before peeling herself away only slightly to look at him, and to breathe air fully back into her lungs. “Deployment will do that.”

She saw him give a glance to the three mice beside her, then back to Hall on her left. He nodded, pulling out a small notebook from his back pocket, and then producing a small pen. Still smiling, he clicked the pen several times.

“I see you’ve already met my best customers. I hope you’re getting acquainted well. Besides Charley, these three keep me in business. What can I get for you and your friend? I assume you wanted to eat before Charley got here?”

Hall nodded for her, briefly. Giving a polite smile while taking a small glance at the menu, just below the kitchen window.

While he ordered, she took a curious glance over to her new animorphic nerd friends. But they weren’t looking at her, or at the food that was placed in front of their waiting hands. Instead, they stared, they’re faced serious and hard. Not as saddened as they were when she asked them if they were from here. But in deep thought.

She lifted an eyebrow, “Are you guys okay?”

They looked up at her, surprised, but still didn’t answer.

Suddenly, she heard Mr. Steinhaur give a surprised joyful laugh. “Well, isn’t this just perfect? Speak of the devil, here she comes now. ”

The front door opened, and the front doorbell chimed loudly in the dead silent room. Marianna turned. Tears already pricking her eyes before she could fully set her eyes on her, but as soon as she did, a singular tear fell and dribbled down her cheek.

Charley stood there. Her hand on the bar of the door, holding it open and letting the cool autumn air rush in. Long hair flowing down her shoulders of her blue button-up. She was still wearing their father’s utility belt wrapped around her tight-fitting black jeans. She had looked the same as the day she had left.

And, to Marianna’s surprise, Charley’s green eyes also filled with tears, threatening to burst.

“Mari?” Charley uttered, her voice soft and breaking.

A million things went through her mind. Mostly every apology she wanted to give her for the past six years. The other things were the memories that she had. Raising Charley in that tiny garage beside her father; being there for her when their father died; leaving her behind for the military; and the fight that ensued afterwards. All the mean words she said to her, and the ones she said right back to Mari.

It was all right in front of her. Ready for her to grab and say to her. But all she could choke out was a small, weak: