4338.211 · July 30, 2018 AD
Three Hundred Kilometres of Bad Decisions
She only stopped for petrol. The goat wasn't part of the plan. Neither were the chickens. Neither was the argument with Paul, or the drive through darkness to an empty house, or the look on his face when she returned without the dog he'd been hoping for. Three hundred kilometres of outback, and all Beatrix has to show for it is a bootful of consequences and a man asking her to fetch chips. The day isn't finished with her yet.
The stop at Yunta was supposed to be brief. Fuel. Maybe some lollies. Then back on the road.
Instead, Beatrix overheard a man named Bill discussing what to do with his old goat Vincent. Too much trouble. New dog doesn't like him. Probably just going to shoot him. The words landed like stones, and before she fully understood what she was doing, Beatrix had liberated Vincent from his cage and loaded him into the backseat. The hens followed—six of them, gathering around her car like witnesses demanding their own rescue.
Paul's reaction at Bixbus was predictable. Disbelief. Frustration. A sneeze so violent it scattered chickens across the Drop Zone. But in the end, he relented. Vincent would be kept safe. The hens would be dealt with.
Then came the real mission: find Paul's dog Charlie in Broken Hill. Beatrix drove through the night, arrived at an empty house, and returned through the Portal with nothing but fatigue and disappointment to show for it.
Paul and Karen were waiting—exhausted, dust-covered, having spent hours chasing her chickens into a BMW.
Now Paul wants chips. Rags, on Oxide Street. Apparently they're divine.
Beatrix is too tired to argue.
