“Call if you need me,” I said to Axle as I left. I jogged over to the car and sidled around to the front passenger side door, opening it to hurriedly get in.

I’m a desert animal. Sunburns never bothered me after the first couple of years in Arizona, and I fell in love with the heat. Something freeing about it, but the heat I felt when I slid into Molls’ den was too much for even me.

I waved a hand in my face and turned to smile at Molls, as sweat popped out on my brow.

“Hi, Tyson. I don’t have long, my second deposition starts soon, but I wanted to see you,” she said.

I reached an arm out to lean on the center divider. “I’m glad to see you too.” An image of her in the sunlight above me flashed through my head, followed closely by the roar of multiple flak cannons ripping me apart. I shoved it away in my mind. “Did you need something?”

Molls slid her tail out from beneath her body and draped it across my arm in a familiar, possessive gesture. I enjoyed the contact and stared at the rattle on the end of her long tail, bouncing it lightly with a fingertip.

“Nothing in particular. Being around you helps me feel more confident, and I could use the boost before my deposition, that’s all,” she said with a smile, staring at her tablet.

Her giant, beautiful green eyes flicked up at me and her smile widened. “Plus, a little physical contact isn’t exactly unwelcome. I think you’ll find that I’m quite affectionate.”

I grinned and ran my hand along the length of her tail, lightly caressing her scales. “Can’t say I dislike that thought.”

She met my eyes as I leaned over and lightly kissed the skin on her tail just above the hard rattle tip, my eyes never leaving hers. A deep purple began to spread across her scales, and Molls surged forward across the seats. She rested her elbows on the sides of the separation in the sweltering car and caressed my chin with one hand.

Her eyes lidded, her lips parted, she took a breath, and I leaned forward to kiss her. My favorite kind of kiss is the kind where you can feel their smile on your lips, and Molls was grinning. Her clean, slightly sweet scent filled my nostrils, and I let go, lost in our shared gesture of intimacy.

Until the tablet in her lap buzzed.

Yellow replaced the purple in her scales, and Molls pulled back with a gasp. Then, while reaching for her tablet, she looked back up at me and grinned sheepishly.

“More of that soon?” she asked, a coy, small smile on her lips.

“Much more, and very soon,” I said. I reached for the car handle to slip out but quickly kissed the spot above the rattle at the end of her tail once more before popping the door.

The October sky hit me like a wave of cool water, and I gulped in a breath of fresh air as I shut the car door behind me. I had just had my first kiss with an alien snake woman, on the same day I murdered my own boss.

The implications swarmed my mind as I returned to my own place, but I pushed them aside when I saw Hord staring at me, fear clear in his eyes.

He had been managing the gobb work crew, but my presence was a clear distraction for the hobb. I approached to talk to him, and Hord stumbled backwards, turning to flee around the other side of the mud-crete house.

“Hord!” I yelled. “Please, come back.”

A moment later, he slunk back around the corner of the building. The hobb’s head would not lift, and he stared at his own feet instead of meeting my eyes.

“Hord, what’s going on with you?” I asked, gently.

“Nothing!” he barked. “Hord good worker. Hord work gobbs.” The hobb kept his hands together, firmly grasping one with the other. He wasn’t even wearing a sidearm anymore.

“Hord, you’re okay, nobody is mad at you. I know you’re a good worker, you’re one of our best. You don’t have to be afraid of me.”

He nodded rapidly. “Hord good worker.”

My mind flashed back to the darkness, the confused hurt and fear glimmering in his eyes as I stepped into Mr. Sada’s home.

“Is this about Mr. Sada?” I asked in a low, quiet voice. His face flashed in front of me, panic on his lips, wild doom in his eyes. I felt a spurt of bile threatened to rise from my stomach.

“Mr. Sada die in dream storm,” Hord instantly barked. “He have nightmare, I try to help, but building fall on him. Not Hord’s fault. Hord good worker.”

Hord had been the closest to him, after myself. They spent a lot of time together. I could see sadness and dejected failure in his eyes. It hurt. I’m sure that it shone in my eyes as well.

I raised a hand to stop him from repeating the clearly rehearsed words. “It wasn’t his world, Hord.” I shook my head sadly. “He didn’t belong here. All we did was let him move on. Hopefully to a place where he does belong and where he can do coke all day while yelling abuse at his underlings.”

“You alright, son?” Mr. Sada asked, again, so many years ago in the pouring rain. I stuff the memory away again, gazing at the distraught man and feeling his emotions pour through him.

“What can I do to help you feel safe here, Hord? Would you rather leave? I’m not going to hurt you.”

The hobb took a deep, shaking breath. For a moment I thought he was going to cry. If he did, I was afraid I might as well.

Instead he shook his head, drawing himself up bold and stout. “Hord good worker. Mr. Sada die in dream storm. He have nightmare. I try to help but building fall on him.”

I waited to see if he would add anything else, but he turned his head away, scanning the ground for anything that wasn’t me and refusing to meet my gaze. “Okay, Hord. I’ll leave, you just keep being a good worker.” I took a few steps away before turning to leave. “I’m sorry, Hord. You’re a good hobb, you don’t deserve this.”

“Sada not deserve this,” I heard him grumble.

True to my word, I walked away, to the top of the nearby privacy mound. I pulled my helmet back on as I went. A bloodstain in the sand caught my attention when I reached the top, and I stopped to stare at it.

The vein-scorpion on the first day. It felt so long ago. Like it happened to someone else.

Someplace else.

The still air of the desert roiled in front of me, spiraling into words and images.

MISS THE DAYS OF YORE? WONDER IF YOU WILL EVER AGAIN EXPERIENCE THE JOY AND LAUGHTER OF YOUTH, THE DAYS OF NO WORRY AND PARENTAL LOVE? WHY NOT TRY GLORY DAYZ, THE BRING YOU BACK AND PUT YOU UP DREAM INDUCER GUARANTEED TO LET YOU LIVE ALL OF YOUR FINEST MOMENTS.

USING GLORY DAYZ, ONE MUST SIMPLY SELECT A FEELING, TIME, PLACE, OR PERSON, AND VOILA — AWAY WE GO! 50,000 morties, 4.3 stars

I rolled over the words, letting my tired eyes ride over the cascading images of fathers throwing their children into the air, of mothers running with their gaggles of children alongside the wave-worn beaches of some faraway place.

Where would I even go with such a product? Flashes of Mr. Sada ran through me and I squeezed my eyes shut, willing the ad to go away. No. Whatever was going to happen, I’d rather do it while forgetting the past. They were instances from a different world, and all that reminiscing would do is make me sad . . . and get me killed.

The ad wasn’t useless, though. If ever I needed to recollect something, or if maybe some memory were somehow stripped from my mind, I knew where I could turn.

Unless it was this memory of this product here and now.

I turned that revelation about a little in my head and bared a rueful smile. There really wasn’t any winning in this bold new world, was there?

I opened my eyes and dismissed the ad, then stared out over the desert sands, lost in thought. How the hell did a slackass loser like me end up the boss of his own kingdom? Was I up to the challenge?

I gazed over the apartments, walls, clumps of people milling about, and envisioned Molls coiled up in my old car, wrapped up in the warmest things she could find, hiding from her own church as Dearth encroached ever closer on our borders.

It really wasn’t a question of if I was up to the challenge. I couldn’t afford to question. This was the here and now and truth be told, I had to be.