We didn’t see any of the Invincible still in the area but we still did our best to skulk through the crops and wiregrass anyway.  Just because we didn’t see them doesn’t mean they weren’t there.  Our best wasn’t very good but no one accosted us.  It seems strange that none of them would be hanging around after the battle looking for stragglers to knock off but maybe the Invincible didn’t even know there was an underground complex, maybe they were just burning fields.  Or maybe they don’t do things based on any logic I would understand.   

Martialla did get her gun to work finally and once we were on the move she shot an armadillo the size of a German Shepard after we chased it through the underbrush for what had to have been at least nine thousand hours.   It had some kind of yellow foam spilling out of its mouth but I’m sure it’s totally safe for us to eat it.  A crew guy on the set of No One Would Tell told me that you can cook an armadillo by just splitting it open down the middle and putting it on a fire – possum on the half shell he called it.  He was right.  It tasted like tender, tender pork.  I feel like I’ve been writing about how things have made me cry a lot lately and I don’t want people to think that I’m weepy so I’m going to say that I saw tears running down Martialla’s face instead as we shoved gobs of armadillo meat in our faces.   

I was licking my fingers like a country rube “I assume if we get leprosy the nanobots in our blood will save us?” 

Martialla gave me the finger gun “You know it.” 

“I’ve been thinking that I don’t really relish the idea of walking all the way back to J-Lo with two broken legs.” 

She snorted “Your legs aren’t broken.  You probably just have an MCL tear and a wrecked hip labrum.  Although your left ankle is for sure busted.  Busted like MC Hammer.” 

I nodded “Timely reference, you’re doing great.  Point being, setting aside your fictional nanobots, with all our various ailments, staggering a hundred miles downriver doesn’t appeal much to me.  How about we build a raft and Huck Finn it on down the river?” 

She chewed for a while before answering “Did you take a carpentry class at the learning annex that I don’t know about?” 

“What carpentry?  It’s a raft, not an armoire.” 

“And how do you propose we build a raft?” 

I gestured at the bounty around us “You just tie some sticks together and raft it up.” 

“Tie them together with what?  How do you get them in the shape of a raft instead of a ball of sticks kind of clumped together?  How do you launch it?  A raft that can carry two people is going to weigh a couple hundred pounds, isn’t it?  How do you make all the sticks the same length?  Didn’t Huck Finn escape in a canoe that he just conveniently happened to find?  I don’t think he built a raft at all.” 

I bit my lip, thinking “I swear in the movie that it was a raft.” 

“Well that’s helpful.  If you want to go by movie rules, think about Castaway.  That’s how you build a raft.” 

“Oh yeah, that did seem like it took a lot of time.  Like years maybe.  But that was a raft to go on the ocean, a river has to be easier right?” All she did was shrug as if to say ‘go ahead and try’.   “Did you cry when Wilson died?” 

“What are you talking about, it was a volleyball, it didn’t die because it was never alive.  It just floated away.” 

I shook my head “You are dead inside.  Aren’t you the one who pretended to be a boy so you could be a cub scout?  Why don’t you know how you build a raft?  What did you get all your badges in?  Being an emotionless robot?” 

She shook her head “That wasn’t cub scouts, that was basketball camp, and it would have worked too, if my boobs hadn’t come in that summer.” She paused for a moment “No comment there?  No joke about how you’re still waiting for my boobs to come in?” 

I shook my head grimly “I have no interest in insulting your boobs Mar, that’s how grim things are.” 

“Shit.” 

“Yeah.”