Icepunk:

Lacking a place to sleep and food in our bellies, Thubthub and I head for the center of town to search for these essentials.

“This sucks,” I tell Thubthub. “That stupid Slappy is ruining my life!”

Thubthub nods agreement. “Hey, Ice, who is that person?” Thubthub asks, pointing at a street vendor a short distance away.

“A hot dog vendor,” I say. “Have you ever had a chili dog before?”

“Dogs frighten me,” Thubthub shudders. “My brother was killed by one.”

“This is food, man. Food. Not dogs - food.” I request ten chili dogs and take them to the park to eat them. At first, Thubthub nibbles hesitantly, then snarfs his chili dogs and asks, “Can I have another?”

“Sure dude. Here’s ten bucks.”

Thubthub eagerly scurries across the busy street, cash in paw.

“Hey, little dude, watch out for traffic!” I warn him.

With a screeching of tires, a car slams on its brakes - but not soon enough to avoid sending Thubthub flying through the air.

“THUBTHUB!”

Malex:

Now I had nowhere to sleep, nothing to eat, and no money to do either of these things. Funny thing was that I honestly couldn’t blame Icepunk for any of this mess. It was really all Zilly’s fault.

Meh, that wasn’t going to keep me from using the disaster as an excuse to part ways with Icepunk. The man was going to get somebody killed soon, and I could only pray that it wasn’t me or someone I cared about.

Eventually, I found myself sitting in a small cafe. Linus was plugged in, and one of the employees had taken pity on me and given me a cup of coffee.

“So what now, boss?” Linus asked.

I looked at him and shrugged. “I honestly don’t know.”

“Well, I hate to stress you, but you should know that I’m kinda depending on you for electricity and maintenance.”

I arched an eyebrow. “Oh really? Maybe you should have thought of that before you floated off and got captured by that evil coot Slappy.”

For the first time in a long time, Linus was silent.

Icepunk:

I run over to where Thubthub landed after being hit by a car. He’s still alive, thank goodness, but his face is all bloody and one of his arms is bent in a way it shouldn’t bend. “Thubthub, can you hear me?”

Thubthub whimpers softly. I pick him up very gently and begin walking to the nearest hospital. “Please don’t die, Thubthub.”

The hospital is only about five minutes away. I know exactly where it is because I’ve been to it on numerous occasions. I immediately carry Thubthub into the emergency room, where the doctors and nurses take care of him.

One of the nurses makes me wait outside the operating room while they operate on my hamster. Eventually the surgeon comes out and sighs.

“Sir, I’m terribly sorry, but I’m afraid we lost him,” the doctor said sadly.

“What? No...” I put my face in my hands. “He was my best friend.”

The surgeon laughs. “Actually, he’s fine; I just love screwing with people like that. Pretty funny, huh?”

I take my face out of my hands and show the surgeon how funny I think he is by punching him in the stomach.

Malex:

I had taken to beating my head on the table repeatedly. Linus was singing some Dumbbutt drinking rhyme in time to the dull thud my skull was producing. That would have been a great way to forget everything, but after a while, I noticed another person at the table.

“Whoa. Echofly?” It took me a second to focus and verify my suspicion.

“What are you doing here?” Echofly asked me.

“I could ask you the same question you know,” I said, still slightly dazed.

“Ah,” she replied, “but you didn’t. I asked you first.”

“I suppose,” I said, pausing to gather my thoughts, “that I am beating my head on this table.”

“Indeed,” she replied dryly.

“He’s not at his best at the moment,” Linus said sarcastically.

Echofly cocked an eyebrow.

I felt as if I was being scrutinized, and I didn’t especially like it. “Well what?” I replied defensively. “I just lost everything but my chronically bitter laptop.”

“Bitter? Look who’s talking,” Linus whispered.

“Oh pshaw!” Echofly said. “You still have your friends.”

I sighed bitterly. “Right. My roommate is a psycho, my laptop would rather think up new ways to be vulgar than have an actual conversation, and the only girl that I’ve really ever cared about hates me.”

Awkward silence.

“Well?” I continued. “Don’t you hate me?”

“Of course not!” she replied. “Why would I?”

I cleared my throat. “Well, I kinda promised to bring you some Chinese take-out, and I kinda never did...”

She laughed. “I suppose I can forgive that, considering the fact that your apartment building just collapsed with all of your stuff in it.”

After that, we talked until it got so late that the cafe closed and the employees kicked us out.

I walked Echofly back to the Good Guys office and said goodnight.

“But where will you stay?” Echofly asked.

“Oh, Icepunk bought a warehouse for his hamster army to train in. I expect I can convince him to let Linus and I sleep there for a while. At least until we find another apartment,” I said.

“Well,” she said, “if you ever get any actual cases, I’ll let you know.”

I gave Echofly the address of the warehouse, promised to give her more contact information as soon as it became available, and promised to try to return to the “Good Guys For Hire” office whenever possible.

Once I arrived at the warehouse, I peered into a window and saw what appeared to be a veritable herd of hamsters training for combat.

I found a loose panel in the wall and crawled inside.

“Icepunk?” I called loudly.

Suddenly, all of the hamsters trained their eyes on me and glared. I heard the clicking of a thousand projectile weapons preparing to fire.

“Uh, Icepunk?” I called weakly.

Icepunk:

I wake up from the least restful sleep I’ve ever had in my life and rub my eyes. Thubthub is going to be okay, but his nose, collar bone and right arm were fractured. Right now he’s sleeping on his hospital bed with a neck brace and a soft cast on his arm.

After checking on Thubthub, I wander out into the hall and find some pop machines. I purchase a Dr.Salt and take a slow swig. With nothing else to do, I wander around the hospital in search of a room with a TV. I discover a door marked ‘break room’ and figure nobody will mind if I slip in for a few minutes to watch TV.

I turn on the TV. “Ooh, a whole fifteen channels of cable television! We only had three hundred at our place,” I say sarcastically. “I miss having a place to live.”

I sit in a chair and go through my wallet to see how much cash I have. Not much; two hundred dollars at the most. I do have a debit card, although my checking account is nearly empty. There’s no money to find a good place to stay, so I suppose I’ll have to move into the warehouse with the hamsters.