Muleman, which is what the mule man assured Steve his real name was, in real life, from before the mule he swore and honestly to Steve it didn’t matter anyway, had an enormous store of goods. Most of them were shit, but the store was enormous.
Steve was invited to pick through the lot, and just as he had recieved this permission to rummage his heart’s desire, Sheila walked up with a rocket launcher attached to one of their attackers. This was not an outcome Steve predicted or desired, and as he was about to announce this to all and sundry he realized that the man wasn’t looking at him, though Sheila was: with hard eyes and her very best ‘Do not do that.’ expression. Comprehension sliding over him like spilled egg on a granite counter he watched the man approach Muleman with a true, goggle-eyed reverance.
“You trade?” Muleman asked, seeing he had a live one and looking, with unmasked lust, at the rocket launcher. The man nodded. “Well,” Muleman said, stretching his arm out behind him in a grand sweep, “what’re you buyin’, stranger?”
While the two of them began their haggle, Steve- disappointed at having been replaced- watched Sheila sidle up to him.
“What’s going on?” he asked, when she was close enough that a whisper was plausible. “Why are you down here?”
“Why are you down here, first of all, if we’re asking those kinds of questions, and second: look,” she said, gesturing. “Clearly this isn’t their specialty.”
Steve, who felt it was his, examined his rival and the cohort with him. Amateurs, he thought, ignoring the fact that they’d tried to acquire his person through violent means already in the last twenty-four hours and were attempting- this time with the aid of some variety of artillery- to do it again. If he could get a word with Muleman they might be at this all day, though that wasn’t a given on any count. He also, if he was being honest, really wanted to have Muleman around for when the cow halved and for him to take some of the disgusting knot of egg production away, so it wasn’t as though Muleman hadn’t won by coming and would continue to win by staying.
However, and this was a key point he could see from a mile off: at the end of all this it was unlikely that the situation would be much changed except for the fact that he and Sheila were now at the bottom of the hill instead of the top. Also-
“Where’s the hermit?”
“He followed you and the dog.”
“Hmm.” Steve glanced back into the trees. Nothing, a dark line of impemetrable green. He looked at the schnauzer, who was investigating the mule with some canine intensity Steve couldn’t quite fathom. He could fathom that they were eye to eye, which even to Steve seemed wrong and yet, there it was. “Seems gone now,” he said, recovering to Sheila.
“Doesn’t he always?” She asked. “What’s your plan?”
“Well, I want to see what he needs,” Steve said, “But now he’s talking to the guy you brought over and-“
“Not for the trader!”
“His name’s Muleman.”
“I don’t care-“
“Which is why I should do the talking.”
“No! What’s the plan for them!” She pointed, urgency overriding discretion, at the massed militia standing just down the road to the right.
“Oh, yeah. No idea yet.” He watched Sheila rolled her eyes, and put his hands up. “To be fair I was working on this,” he said, indicating Muleman. “I mean they come around but not often. Think about all the towels we’ve got up there.” Think also, he wanted to say, about how literally everyone had stopped for this and how the man who’d approached with Sheila was now handing over his cowboy hard hat in exchange for what looked like a pair of steel-toed boots and a huge canteen with webbing all over it, but since that hadn’t been part of his own plan he decided to let that particular lying dog stay asleep.
But he did acknowledge he needed a plan and that this was a fantastic thing to have with that particular need on the table. He set his brain the task and recieved nothing immediate, hoping after that result that something would flit along later.
Sometimes inspiration strikes. Sometimes it doesn’t. We think- and this should by no means be taken as an attack on spontanaeity in situations where lives either aren’t at stake or don’t matter- that it’s better to have a plan that can be executed. But the question does arise: in a world created as part of a lack of plan, or even in a world created as the result of a plan- flawed or unflawed- is it better, perhaps, to not plan? To fly by the increasingly worn seat of one’s predisaster pants? Given how the plans worked out, it’s worth considering. Meanwhile, Steve is flailing and in this case we do digress.
Muleman and the Mob Man seemed to be wrapping up. Steve was not excited about it, because he hadn’t yet arrived at a course of action which didn’t end in his own demise, down here on the mob’s chosen ground. He didn’t much like that idea and began, in a panic- a placid one, as was his way, but nonetheless- casting about for ideas. Then one bit.
“Muleman,” he said, and Muleman and the Mob man both looked at him. “Got some livestock up the hill. If you’re interested. Can’t bring it down, though. Unweildy.”
Muleman’s eyes lit up as he glanced down at his mule. The militia leader narrowed his at Steve, suspicious and dangerous again.
“Livestock, y’say? What varieties then?”
“Got a few,” Steve said, “major one is a cow bout to halve.” Gold coins might as well have fallen out of Muleman’s sleeves as he reached for his reins and looked for instruction. Steve, a trader by nature, wondered at the man’s abandonment of bargaining posture.
“Well let’s go!” Muleman said. “Sir,” he turned back to the militia leader. “I’m not one to abandon a negotiation- why not ride up the hill with me and we’ll continue our talks?” The militia leader peeked at his rocket launcher, shrugged, took a proferred hand helping him up onto the seat of the mulecart, and shot an evil smile at Steve. “And now: lead the way!”
Unhappy at the turn of events but unable to see much he could do about it, Steve began walking up the road toward the drive, patting the schnauzer as he past. It stood and followed at his heel, shoulder to shoulder with the mule. Sheila trailed the procession, sublimated violence rolling off her in waves that Steve, without seeing her and twenty or thirty feet distant, could feel in his toenails.
The small group approached the larger one, which- at a signal from the leader that may or may not have been necessary given the deference in the air for the mule man- parted and allowed them to pass. Out of the corner of his eye, Steve saw the trader glance up the ruined hill.
“That’s not the way up,” he said.
“Might be,” the militia leader said.
“You didn’t have to blow up the woods.”
“You didn’t have to blow my cousin’s head off.”
“Fuckin’ did,” Sheila shouted from her trailing position. “Try it again.”
“Don’t have to now,” the leader replied, pointing softly at the morass of splinters. “Got a nice big vista for intel.”
“I will end you.”
“Gentlemen!” Muleman said, cutting through the tension, just ahead of Steve, who closed his mouth somewhat appreciatively. “And lady.”
“Gentlemen’s fine.”
“Nothin’ gentle about you.”
“Fuck off.”
“Please!” Muleman said, rising again. “My mule is very sensitive.” It tossed its head, in clear agreement, and the two, baffling Steve, mumbled apologies to the man and his mule.
“I’m sorry about your cousin,” Steve said, pointing to the drive ahead. The man grunted. So did Sheila, but Steve felt confident they weren’t the same grunt. He continued “This is the way up.” He paused, but couldn’t resist. “Most of the time.”
“Well, we’ll see how that goes,” said the militia leader, as Muleman tugged the reins and pulled his conveyor over onto the track. Steve, concerned, shifted in his seat to see the man’s face. It wasn’t set particularly nicely, but the fact remained that their best hope in Steve’s mind was somehow winning him over.
He had no idea how that was going to happen, but his attendance on the trader and up the hill alone with the party presented some opportunities that Steve was proud to say he created. Death wasn’t quite so certain anymore. In fact, he thought, it had probably gotten back down around the fifty percent mark, which made him smile.
Things, after all that had happened since he woke up yesterday morning, were back to normal.
