Not too far away, a rabbit was wearing a hat. Although, explaining that it's a rabbit is technically a disservice, for it's no more a rabbit than a hamster is an octopus. But it was small and fluffy, and through an absence of any competition, had become known as a rabbit-like creature around these parts.

At this point, the rabbit-like creature wearing a hat was observing three figures. The first was a man it recognised as the Bringer of the Hat, and he was fleeing wildly and making a loud, high-pitched sound. Fleeing and screaming was something the rabbit-like creature understood, and so he quietly rooted for his large human friend.

Right behind the running figure was a shiny human with only one grentuputron eye (rabbit-like creatures have their own colours). It was shouting as well, and gaining quite quickly on the first figure.

The third figure was in the back, trying to keep up. The rabbit-like creature with the hat knew he would be the first to die if a Waste Beast was chasing them. You never had to be a fast runner in the Waste, only faster than the creatures you were with.

As the wind picked up around it, the rabbit-like creature observed the shiny human tackling the friendly human to the ground. Then it caught the scent of something tasty nearby, and decided that it had seen enough of the show.

It hopped away.

* * *

Now it was no longer now, it was later. And later, which is now known as now, Bert was pissed.

Phoenix groaned loudly, holding a defrosted slab of bloody meat to his swollen forehead. It was a few hours later, to be precise. Phoenix was in Smack-dab, having only just returned. Stumbling home had been more unconsciousy than he predicted.

"And you just ... told them?!" Bert growled, huffing and puffing, pacing angrily on the spot. The situation had just been explained to her, and she wasn't taking it well.

Meatsack hovered nearby, the trusty first aid box held tightly in his fingers. He'd already mummified Phoenix with bandages, and wasn't sure what to do next other than fret. He was very good at fretting.

Phoenix himself was covered head to boots in mud, dust and blood. His own blood, mostly. And a little steak juice, on account of the defrosting. He was bruised all to hell, and every time someone plugged up one of the holes in his skin, another one burst open and leaked just as much. It was like trying to save a sinking ship, which, coincidentally, is similar to how Bert currently viewed the man. Except it was a ship she wasn't going to go down with.

"In my defence, Bert, there was an Overlord stomping on my skull at the time," Phoenix mewed weakly, scrounging for some semblance of redemption. "That's prolly why I passed out for so long."

Her sapphire fire bore holes into his eyes. "Phoenix, how could you be so stupid? They didn't know about us, and now they do. And they think we murdered their trailer folk. We're supposed to be staying out of all this!"

Phoenix involuntarily flinched as she paced past him. The heat of her anger could have scraped paint off the walls (if there was any). "Look, I said already, I told them about Terrance and what he did."

"They just didn't believe you."

"Err ... no."

"And now they think there's some piss-weak bar with no defences, killing their folk."

"Yes." Phoenix was visibly shrinking.

"And an H-unit can run almost as fast as a vehicle, so they've probably already reached the Fort by now."

"...yes."

"And we know this new bandit lord has a truck to come back with."

"...yes..."

"So he's going to get here within the hour."

Phoenix didn't respond this time. He hung his head. Which is fine, because it saved Bert the trouble of doing it to him.

Bert finally stopped pacing, her fingers curling and uncurling (fisting, you might call it), her dangerous glare unleashing itself on a window, staring out to the depths of the Waste. Her human hand twitched unnervingly close to the bone-handled pistol at her hip.

All around her, customers waited in an understandably nervous silence. Most of the traders from the night before were still sitting around consuming a drink or six, "working themselves up" for going out in the cold. But Bert knew they'd be staying another night at this rate. And in fact, she counted on it. Her prices had mysteriously, but encouragingly, dropped.

But first they'd have to survive whatever was about to happen.

She turned her head to cast a gaze across her customers' myriad grubby, uncertain faces...

...and hoped like hell some of them had guns.

* * *

The rabbit-like creature with the hat had lost track of its enemy. It had been trailing a smaller rabbit-like creature (no hat), who was known to rabbit-like society as an upstart, a wannabe king. But just before the rabbit-like creature with the hat could pounce and end the rebellion before it began, a gritty, wheezing noise startled the smaller animal and it bolted.

And now the rabbit-like creature with a hat watched with the pure naivety that only animals can achieve as a large, loud object rumbled towards it on the human's road. Whatever it was, it was huge, and it belched a thick, black cloud of smoke as it approached. It was spiky, and growled like nothing else. The rabbit-like creature with a hat pondered if it might be some type of new Waste Beast.

It knew that it should flee, but something about this large creature was mesmerising. The behatted rabbit-like creature couldn't take its eyes off the thing's dirty red colour, the glittering scales plating its nose and flanks, and most of all, its two glowing yellow eyes.

The large, rumbling spiky creature spewed out another cloud of smoke, its growling growing in volume.

The rabbit-like creature with a hat cocked its head.

The spiky thing got closer.

It squished the rabbit-like creature, and its hat.

* * *

"Bert," Phoenix pleaded, "the Tax folk might have come here anyway. If Terrance hadn't murdered the trailer gang, they might have walked all the way up the Back Road. We couldn't hide forever."

Bert locked eyes on Phoenix. "But they also might not have. If they didn't even know we were out here, they had no reason to come up this road."

"That we know of."

She gritted her teeth. "Yeah, that we know of."

"So," Phoenix continued, feeling emboldened by his slight victory, "what I'm saying is, we can't just stay isolated forever. The Waste doesn't work that way. At some point you're going to have to come out of this, this shell and build relationships, alliances! Or else we're always gonna be someone's bitch. If not this farmer guy, then the next lord. Or the one after that."

Bert raised her hand to cut him off. "No! Building relationships is what got Smack-dab messed up the last time. What got The Woman killed."

Phoenix frowned. "Not making any friends is going to get us killed!"

Pipes whistled. Bert thrust her chunky robotic finger towards the man. "No, Phoenix, you've gotten us killed!" she growled. "You and your damn big-ass mouth."

Phoenix was struck by a shockwave. As in, a wave of shock. He was shocked. And it hit him in a wave-like manner. The wave continued past him, sweeping over the bar. Smack-dab's light background chatter was snuffed out. All eyes rotated to Bert. Phoenix opened his mouth to say something else, then his eyebrows turned upwards and he looked hurt. Bert breathed heavily for a moment, her face stuck on full burn. Blood boiled in her cheeks.

Then she felt a large hand weigh her shoulder down, and turned to see Meatsack standing there. His eyes were lightly covered in tears, his lip quivering. Bert looked up into at least one of those little eyes and swallowed hard. She couldn't stay mad with that face staring at her. Slowly, the harsh edge of her face softened and she reached up to put her hand on his, letting out a long breath.

"I'm sorry, Phoenix," she said, quietly. "I shouldn't have said that."

Phoenix looked at the floor. "You really think we're gonna die?"

Another silence permeated the air.

Then Bert spoke. Her voice was low, but it was edged with something sharp. Something determined, that wouldn't back down. Something ... something very Bert. "Not a chance. Not if I can help it."

Phoenix looked up. "So what do we do? Farmer Brown will be on his way here. He's prolly already close."

Bert's brow furrowed with thought. She paced around the front of the bar quietly, tapping her face with a human finger. Farmer Brown was on his way to either claim Tax, seek revenge for the murdered bandits, or a mix of both. Possibly a mix of both. ...probably a mix of both.

But then, just how many troops would a bandit lord bring to some backwater bar in the middle of nowhere? If the stories were true, his soldiers were spread all over Can't Be Buried, even as far north as Rangi's. It would be stupid to bring an army to a bar fight, so surely he'd just bring a regular, run o' the Waste horde? And most bandit hordes weren't too scary once you got past their leader.

Adapt.

Back in the day, just two angry women and a handful of weapons fended off one of the fort's most infamous historic leaders. They did it by themselves, and Bert had only gotten better with a pistol since then. And, arguably, quite a bit angrier. So maybe all she had to do was look tough enough to make this Farmer Whatshisface think twice about assaulting Smack-dab and instead sit down for a civil chat. Or at least as civil as a bandit lord can be when all he really wants is to rip your head off your neck.

Bert's eyes fell upon the statue at the front of Smack-dab. She slowed to a halt, unable to take her gaze elsewhere. Sure, her and The Woman had fended off the horde, but at what cost? And what would the cost be this time?

"Bert," said a croaky voice, one of the traders. She looked like a mad old hag, sitting by a dusty window gazing out with a wrinkled face. "Ya got people comin' this way."

Bert tore her stare from the statue and bounded over to the window with the trader. "What kind of people, Maggie?"

"Too far t' tell, Bertie. They's kickin' up a dust storm an' a half, though. I reckons you got an engine incoming."

Sure enough, not too far down the Back Road to the south, a large, boxy silhouette was bouncing closer to Smack-dab. It was decked out with what looked like spikes and billowing flags, and it coughed noxious black fumes into the air. A dust cloud trailed behind it like a loyal hound.

Learn to adapt, The Woman's voice echoed, and you'll be ready for anything.

The fine-tuned cogs in Bert's brain grinded into overdrive. There wasn't any time left to doubt, to pussy out. Maybe this encounter would cost her, but at least then it would be over. Either way, there was no backing out. Now it was time for some cold, hard staunching.

She pulled back from the window, took two steps away and looked swiftly around the room.

"Listen up!" she shouted.

They listened in an upwards direction.

"Who here has guns?"

The traders all looked at each other for a moment, a murmur rippling through the crowd. There were maybe ten or so traders in Smack-dab today, and about half put their hands up.

Bert narrowed her eyes. "Who here has guns that actually work?"

A few put their hands down.

Alright, she thought to herself. There was no way in hell some big-thinking bandit lord was going to waltz into her place and demand so much as a place to piss without paying the proper dues. This was Bert's home, this was her love, her reason for existing: To run Smack-dab, keep the dream alive, and keep it out of filthy bandit hands. And all the bizarre gods in the Waste wouldn't be able to help this farming asshole if he so much as laid a finger on it. Or Meatsack. Or Phoenix, for that matter. Well, or Phoenix a second time.

"OK, here's what's going to happen," she stated, loud enough that everyone could hear whether they wanted to or not. Nobody was going to slack off defending the bar. If they wanted a drink, they'd bloody earn it.

"I need your help defending Smack-dab, and I'm willing to offer free grog, food and lodgings to anyone willing to pitch in."

This got an approving mutter from the crowd.

"Good. Alright. Everyone in this room is going to arm themselves and take up defensive positions in a ring around this door." She thumbed to the front door. "I want tables flipped up, and anyone who's got a gun in the front row. Phoenix."

The man stood up, wincing.

"I need you on your rifle behind the bar."

He grinned wide, clearly relieved the punishment and yelling was over. "Yes, boss." He limped off behind Bert to get his weapon set up.

One of the customers put up her hand nervously.

Bert took one glance and knew what the question would be. Traders were simple folk. "Yes, you can take your drinks with you while you work."

The customer cheered along with her peers and everyone in the room started moving. Just like the famous Waste battle of Da Big Fort, a whole load of nothing was being pushed, shoved and grunted at until it became a something. Hopefully a fortressy something. Tables became walls, traders became soldiers, and one old man, who had fallen asleep despite the excitement, became a tripping hazard. Soon, spiky things poked through gaps between tables, and anyone with a gun was checking it was actually clean enough to shoot like they'd promised.

Bert stood with her fists on her waist amidst the chaos, Meatsack hunched and trembling by her side. She gave the guy a wide smile and put a comforting hand on his small arm. "Meatsack," she said quietly, "I need you to go hide in your room again, OK? I can't risk you getting mad and upsetting our new guests. You can come out when the bad men are gone, and you might need your mop."

She paused and thought about this for a second. "...you'll probably need your mop."

The giant mutant nodded anxiously and then vanished into the bowels of the building.

And a wheezing, grunting engine could be heard coming closer outside.

"Nobody," Bert shouted, "and I mean nobody, fire a shot or so much as say a word until I order it, you hear?"

A loud silence yelled back.

"Alright. I'm going to try to solve this with words, like civilised folk ought to."

Bert flexed her robotic hand and rested the palm of her human one on her pistol grip, standing firmly in the middle of the room, right in front of the main entrance. She spread her legs a little ways apart, hip jutting to one side, face set hard in a glare. Sassy, but dangerous. Her sapphire eyes bore holes into the front door. Let them just try to take something from this bar.

Let them fucking try.

* * *

So, place yer bets: Is she gonna be able to solve this with words, like civilised folk ought to?

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