"where did you find it?" Catnip asked, moving her tools and a collection of parts out to where Dee had parked the battered sports car. Dee's mask made a series of symbols, and then settled on '^_^'. "Behind an old repair shop to the northeast. Needed a couple new tires, and it took some doing to get it going. In the end, I had to hotwire it. I have the keys, but there's something wrong with the wiring in the steering column." Catnip propped the hood open with a heavy stick, considered it for a moment, and then set to work removing the hood entirely. It would be better, she decided, if she didn't have to work with that part hovering over her head. Fortunately for Catnip, Dee was competent and caught on to her words for various mechanical terms rather quickly. She stripped out a cable bundle, considered it, and then tossed it into a bin she'd brought along marked with the word "GARBEJ" in red marker. "So..." hazarded Dee as Catnip tugged a cracked rubber hose out of it's place and spilling oil all over her hand when the hose suddenly crumbled at the minor pressure she exerted on it, "Catnip huh?" He handed her a rag, the oil would soak into her fur and be hell to clean out later. The questioning way he'd said it went over her head. "Yes? What?"
'o~0' "what?"
"You said my name."
'0~o' "Uh... Why do these people call you Catnip?"
"It's my name."
'o~o' "Yeah, sure. But whats your real name?"
"Catnip is my real name."
Dee decided to change the subject as this topic wasn't going to go anywhere. "How long have you been... You know... A mutant? I wasn't always like this myself." He held up his hands so Catnip could see the olive tan scales, but she wasn't looking. He was thinking about it. "After the end of, well... everything, I was taken in by a guy. He did this to me." Catnip straightened up and tossed a handful of bolts and nuts into the bin. "twenty three Christmases, but Dervish said I was eleven."
'0_0' "eleven what? years? christmases? What?"
"I'm twenty three christmases old, I've been a mutant for twenty three christmases."
'o_0' "How is that possible? I don't understand what you mean at all."
Dee was starting to catch on though, a little. Maybe Catnip couldn't explain it like this guy she named could, but he sort of understood. Sort of. 23 years. Catnip asked for a tool, and Dee handed it over. "I came from a lab. Dervish said it was a bad lab. I didn't know about time because I was always underground and didn't know what time was, but I could count christmases. It was a popular topic, and every so often it would come around and everyone would get presents except me... Dervish said christmases are a poor way to keep time in a place like that, and Nathan used to say that christmas wasn't for bad girls." Catnip tapped an experimental finger against the side of a little plastic tank, it broke apart at that and spilled a green fluid all over. "Whoever owned this thing before left it sitting with a lot of fluids in it." She commented. "I wonder how the oil is." She withdrew the dip stick, and was surprised to find that it didn't seem to have any in it at all. "I wonder how it didn't seize up. well, at least we won't have to drain the engine." Dee just watched her appraisingly. He decided he'd ask her something else, she didn't seem to have much interest in what she was, though secretly she did. "Wha-" She interrupted him,
"What do you want this machine for anyway? There aren't many people to impress unless you intend to display it to the biters. "Gonna make it into a scout car, remote controlled. It's gonna be great, though I guess it won't be autonomous li- OH! I can't believe I forgot!" Catnip wondered what he'd forgotten, she wiped her hands again, looking at her fur and coming to the same conclusion Dee had when he'd passed her the rag. He made his way to the back of his workshop and seemed to fiddle around with something she couldn't see. "I forgot to introduce you!" he said excitedly as his 'children' came out of standby mode, springing to life in an instant. "Guys, this is Catnip, Catnip these are- Catnip?" She was no where in sight. He found her curled up, wide eyed, under the car. Antifreeze trickled down over her muzzle as a slow drip. Again, he was struck by how easy it was for her to squeeze under that small space.
'O_O' "Uh, Catnip?"
"Shhh. Robots!"
')_)' "Yeah, what about them? They are my creations."
"Robots punish! Skitters everywhere!"
He looked around. Skitters? "Catnip, there aren't any skitters out here? Just my bots. Hector knocked on the 'GARBEJ' bin. "Grettings, whats up? Came over to see if I could lend a hand. Where's Catnip?" Dee gestured towards the underside of the car, but there was no need. Catnip was squeezing herself out from under the car. "Sir Loin! Robots!" She ran to him and hid behind the bin. "Yeah? It's fine Catnip. They are harmless." It certainly seemed true. The robots moved slowly towards Dee with what could possibly described as 'casual obedience.' Catnip looked at them distrustfully. Hector could tell that Dee was perplexed in the extreme. Hector explained simply, "She had a hard life before the cataclysm."
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