I woke up sneezing, trying to get the heavy scent of patchouli out of my nostrils. My head was throbbing somewhat fierce, the right side of my face felt bloodshot and swollen where Mohawks fist had met skin and bones, but at least it did seem like nothing was broken.
I didn't know where I was, but the smells surrounding me weren't familiar, so I assumed we had left my apartment. Music was playing somewhere behind me, a pretty good recording of The Cramps' 'Faster Pussycat'. I found it to be enormously irritating, but it made me carefully raise my head from the cushion I had been cuddling unconsciously.
I found myself lying on a couch right next to a spartanic, battered and old desk that looked like it had been timbered out of fruit crates and pilings, then diligently coated in black and white zebra stripes. The couch itself was covered with a dark grey spreadsheet made of cotton, and the alleged cushion I had cuddled proved to be a pretty big pink plush unicorn with the silliest grin I had ever seen on a stuffed animal. It made me sit up with a quick jerk that brought stars to my eyes and made me gasp softly. No fast motions with a concussion, I reminded myself as I slowly peeled my eyes open again.
To my left there was a big twin bed with crumpled bedding and a canopy of small bats cut out of foamed rubber and suspended on black yarn. I must have stared about thirty seconds before I remembered I had to breathe, the sight was just too tacky to be real. But sure enough, even after blinking and rubbing my eyes the flock of black batman signs still hovered above the sheets.
Dark hardwood floor stretched between bed, couch and something that looked like a wooden bannister separating this living room from a staircase leading down, and a set of five shabby wardrobes covered the opposite wall. Another door to the other side of the desk led from the bedroom into another room, but I didn't dare stand up to have a look yet.
Between the Wardrobe and the bannister I spotted a huge metal trunk with a digital combination lock, and it made me pause for a second. Nothing in this room seemed to be of any value other than an emotional or nostalgic one, except for that little security vault. I practically itched to go over there and open it, and before I even realized that I was stark naked, I already had crossed half of the room.
My sense of scenting helped a lot as I crouched down in front of the trunk, leaning forward to suck in the air above it. Gun oil, black powder, the sharp pang of smoothed metal blades and something harsh and chemical I had never smelled before and couldn't identify. A weapons chest I assumed, while my fingers scratched and tapped against the display of the combination lock. I leaned down, pressing my ear against the mechanism, listened intently to the soft clicking and humming it made when I pressed some of the buttons. I must have been totally consumed by my inspection, because when I suddenly felt something hard and cold pressed against my neck, I nearly jumped head first into the wall behind the trunk.
"You better not play around with that, scrap. Those things tend to explode." Mohawk rasped amused, tapping the gun against the back of my head. Again he had sneaked up and pulled a weapon on me, and I felt like a bloody fool.
