Chapter 6 Whitney
Whitney
The first trip we ever took to Disneyland lasted three days.
My college visit to Rice University in Houston took three days.
And I spent three days locked in a room, writing my thesis paper before I graduated college.
Now I have the same amount of time to reform an immortal psycho, and I have no idea where to even start.
We’re all doomed.
Because I’m the worst person I can imagine to show him that earth is great and convince him that he shouldn’t slaughter people.
I don’t even like most people. In fact, I might be the single worst-suited person alive for the task of sweet-talking a death demon so he won’t go on another mass-slaughter rampage.
And how do you convince someone not to implement their plan to eliminate all the dark, old, sick people of the world when their basic premise makes no sense, but they think it does?
Ugh.
As we trudge along, I begin to come up with the start of a plan. If he’s spent his entire existence trying to restore balance to an overly growing and thriving human population, and if he gets his jollies from killing people, what might change that?
Triple chocolate ice cream.
A spin on a great roller coaster.
Watching a child hug their mother.
Basically, my grand plan for saving humanity in three days involves trying to win over a death demon to the prospect of living. It’s not a great plan, but it’s something. And I did negotiate for three days with someone who told me repeatedly he wouldn’t negotiate.
It’s really too bad he didn’t trap someone else, someone like Amanda Saddler, or maybe my bright and bubbly cousin, Emery. She’d have been great. She’d giggle-smile him into caring about humanity.
Or maybe he’d have un-alived her right off like everyone else.
Maybe it’s my perverse and irritating nature that fooled him into bonding me and gave me the chance to win us this small reprieve.
I don’t plan to waste it, no matter what twist of fate flung me into his path.
I do think the key to my success lies in figuring out why he won’t kill me, because I think there’s something there he isn’t telling me.
Mom always says the way to really do right by someone is to figure out what they want and then contrast that with what they need. People don’t usually want the thing that they truly need, and they don’t usually know what they need, only what they want. So my goals are:
1. Figure out what Mr. Death wants.
2. Figure out what he needs.
3. Figure out why he hasn’t just killed me.
And…
4. Use this information to put him back inside the mountain or end him so I can save the world.
Easy peasy, right?
Right.
So far, he’s doing exactly what he said he would. We’ve started passing way more cars and settlements, and the cars aren’t crashing, and nothing around us is burning. Also, as we move toward Reno in the darkness, the lights around us aren’t all blinking out, so the tech seems not to be imploding.
I pat his neck. “When you’re able to talk again, I’d like to know what you do to cell phones and the internet and why you do it.
I’d also like to know what you meant when you said you were attracting attention.
” I yawn. “And I’d like to know when we’re stopping, exactly, because I’m really, really tired. ”
I’m starting to sway on his back a little.
At first, it’s just swaying, but after a few minutes, it’s more noticeable. When a car pulls over on the side of the road and someone starts yelling at me, I nearly fall off his back.
“What?”
“I said, do you need help?” The driver’s staring at me like I’ve lost my mind.
“I’m so proud of you for not killing them.” I rub his neck near the patch of hair I yanked bald when I startled awake. “Sorry about pulling that big chunk of hair out.”
“Hello?” The man looks pretty impatient for a do-gooder.
“I’m fine,” I say. “Just doing a little training out here.”
“You’re thirty miles from the closest hotel,” the man says. “Are you sure you’re alright?” He’s driving a Honda. What is he thinking he’d do to help me? It’s not like he could pull a trailer, even if he had one.
“Actually,” I say. “How about I get off my horse, and you can let us climb into your car, and then you can give us a ride to Battle Mountain?”
Before I can explain that I’m kidding, Xolotl shifts.
I nearly faceplant in the dirt.
The man blinks furiously.
“I’ve never been in a car.” Xolotl takes a step closer, his huge black boots pristine in the dusty desert landscape. “I’d like to try it.”
The man starts rolling up his window, but it’s clear he’s not about to take us anywhere. Xolotl shifting into a massive male human in all black scared him.
“Now look what you did.”
Xolotl snaps, and the man slumps against the steering wheel of the car.
“Hey,” I shout. “You agreed to no killing.”
“He made you an offer,” he says. “You’re an attractive woman he pretended to want to help, but really he had other plans.” His eyes narrow. “His soul is very dark.” His face is grim. “And now we can just take his already powered-up car.”
That wasn’t what I expected him to say, and I know I can’t really stop him from doing anything, but I still feel the need to object as he chucks the man’s body on the side of the road and climbs into the driver’s seat.
“You’re breaking your end of our deal.” Something else hits me. “And hey, you can’t even drive. You’re getting in on the wrong side.”
“Why can’t I drive?” He freezes, hovering over the seat.
“It’s dangerous for someone to drive when they don’t know how,” I say. “You might kill us both.”
He laughs as he sits.
“I mean it.” I tug on his sleeve, trying to get him out. “These cars go really fast, and it takes humans weeks and weeks to learn to use them properly.”
“I’ll be fine.” He’s actually smiling. “I’ve been watching the humans propelling themselves along, and many times now, I’ve thought that I might like to try doing it myself.”
“Lemme tell you about a little something called an airplane.”
“The roaring metal birds that shoot through the air overhead while carrying people inside?”
“Oh, no,” I say. “Have you already seen them?”
“I’ve felt them.”
“And you crashed them?” I glare.
He shrugs. “I didn’t crash them. I merely ended the people who were keeping them from crashing, apparently.”
I can’t contain my groan. “That’s on the naughty list too, for the next three days, okay?”
“I didn’t say you could dictate everything I do for three days.” He’s looking at the car as though he’s going to just figure out how to drive it by staring at the dashboard long enough.
“You really should trade places with me, you know. I already know how to drive, and you can at least watch me do it.”
“You might try to crash us into a wall or drive us off a cliff.” He scowls.
“That’s a really good idea.” I can’t help my smile. “Especially if you’re not wearing a seatbelt, and I am.”
“Seatbelt.” He glances at it, and then he smirks. “A safety restraint, I assume. I think I’ll figure the relevant parts out myself.”
“You’re probably more likely to kill me with your ignorance than I am to rid myself of you on purpose.” I snort.
“And for the record, I didn’t kill the man driving this car because he was dark or evil.
” He arches one perfect eyebrow. “It may have sounded that way, but I don’t feel guilt over doing what I was created to do, no matter the condition of the soul of the one who dies.
I mentioned his darkness to assuage your guilt, misplaced though it clearly is. ”
“That’s what the three days are for, right?” I ask. “For me to try and change your mind about whether you should feel guilt.”
“You believe that you can show me that I should only kill unworthy humans.” He grips the gear shifter.
“You’re wrong.” Instead of looking at me to drive his words home, he shoves the car into reverse and we peel out backward onto the freeway, nearly crashing into oncoming traffic—two cars that were actually moving the correct direction.
I might scream a little more than was necessary.
“I told you,” he says calmly, as he properly uses the brake to stop our backward progress. Cars veer around us, honking loudly. “I pick things up fast, and even a crash won’t harm me or you.”
With no direction from me, he shoves the car into drive and takes off—peeling out with a smile—and suddenly we’re headed for Battle Mountain even faster than we were before.
The thought of reaching a hotel soon somehow makes me feel more tired, not less.
Then Xolotl swerves and I’m immediately wide awake again.
“Wow, that was neat. We almost took out that light pole.”
“Relax.” He’s grinning. “This is enjoyable.”
Why do all boys like cars?
And why didn’t I think of this before?
I should have had him steal a better car.
Of course, for him, stealing a car means killing its driver.
How did I forget that, even for a second?
The psychopath beaming next to me is a mass murderer.
It’s definitely not cute that he’s grinning like a little boy as he passes other cars going— “Holy crap! Are you driving over a hundred miles per hour?”
That’s when the sirens and flashing lights start.
“What kind of car has flashing lights?” He tightens his hands on the wheel. “I want one.”
And now he’s about to kill a cop, probably. I groan. “Those lights indicate that you have to pull over. The local law enforcement has taken issue with you driving at reckless speeds that are unsafe for other drivers and yourself.”
He’s frowning.
The cop has, impressively, pulled up ahead of us, and is now slamming on his brakes. Even more impressively, Xolotl manages to slow down and then stop without sending my body through the front windshield. With a little hand motion from me to guide him, he even rolls down his window.
“Hey officer,” I say, before Xolotl can say something awful like, goodbye, or now you die. “We were going a little too fast, huh?”