Bait Dog An Atlanta Burns Novel - By Chuck Wendig Page 0,60

shop!” And he’s off like an Iditarod Husky with a stun gun stuck under its tail. She rolls her eyes and follows after, finds him rifling double-time through a long-box of dusty old comics. She sees titles she doesn’t recognize—Outsiders, Starman, New Mutants—alongside a few she does—Batman, Flash, Avengers.

Shane looks like a miner who just found a rich vein of gold, but Atlanta has to hook him under the arm and drag him back out. “That’s not why we’re here, geek-boy. I need stuff.” Yesterday she nabbed an advance of cash from Jenny—soon as Jenny started writing a check, Atlanta said she needed the real deal instead, cold hard greenbacks, thanks—and now here she is, prepping for next week’s trip to the Farm.

They muscle past a pair of super-fat middle-age hausfraus in too-tight sweat pants (on the one is emblazoned the words “juicy” in pink glitter type, calling to mind not unbridled sexiness but, rather, a canned ham) and Atlanta finds what she’s looking for: Keystone Mobile, a grungy overstuffed stall full of mobile accessories and headsets from the early 2000s, plus a ton of old phones crammed together in a glass case.

Dude behind the counter is a lanky sort with crow-slick hair and a patchy beard poking up out of his face like a bed of bad weeds. She tells him she needs a burner—no plan, just a pay-as-you-go.

“Kinda phone?” he asks.

“Don’t care. Something that’s all phone, though. I don’t want to play fruity little games on it.”

Shane chimes in: “Angry Birds is pretty cool.”

“They don’t sound cool. They sound angry.”

“What provider is this? AT&T? Sprint?”

Atlanta doesn’t know, so she just shrugs. Shane asks the scraggly-beard, who says, “We’re an… independent provider.” He starts boxing up a basic gray candy bar phone: an austere little brick of forgotten technology. He goes into a spiel, sounds rehearsed and mechanical: “Keystone Mobile. You’ll hear about us in a few years when our patented 5G signal goes—“

“That’s not a real service,” Shane whispers in her ear, but she shushes him and pays for the phone. Then she drags him on toward their next stop.

And here, again, Shane’s eyes go big and bulgey.

Atlanta taps the counter. “I need a box of shells.”

Shane’s not paying attention. Instead he recites a litany of what he sees: “Tonfa. Sais. Manrikigusari. Wakizashi. Katanas! Oh, dude, whoa, katanas.” He scurries over to a wall clad in velvet drape with various implements of ninja destruction hanging there. Then he spies a wall of medieval weaponry—swords and maces and pieces of armor—and dashes over to that. The guys behind the counter who look like carnies, watch him and snicker.

“Eyes up here,” Atlanta says. “I said, I need shells. Gimme the .410s.”

One of the carnies, a scruffy ginger, reaches in past a display of Zippo lighters and butterfly knives, and plunks a box out on the glass. “Shooting squirrels?”

“Rats,” she says.

“Cool.”

* * *

The parking lot is about as apocalyptic as it was inside: beater cars and certified POSes left and right. Molester van sitting cock-eyed next to a pimped-up Cadillac. Lots of rust and second- or third-hand rides. Atlanta and Shane weave between crap-bucket cars. He finally gets the advantage and scoots in front of her.

“You have to let me go with you,” he says. “I wanna go.”

She slides past him, almost knocks the long velvet-wrapped package out from under his arm. “I can’t believe you bought that thing.”

“It was only a hundred bucks.” He tucks the fabric-clad katana tighter. “It’s awesome.”

“It’s a flea market katana. It’s pretty douchey.”

“Is it?”

“Kinda. Like, if you smelled of Drakkar Noir and wore gold chains and pretended to meditate and were in your mid-40s and stuff, I would totally expect to find a katana on your wall.”

He chases after again. “Maybe it’s for home protection. You ever think of that?”

“A shotgun is for home protection. A katana is for dudes who want to pretend to be a ninja. And by the way, a cheap-shit katana won’t cut through a bubble bath much less a burglar or serial killer.”

“It seemed pretty sharp to—“ Shane growls in frustration. “You’re changing the subject.”

“Correction: I already changed the subject.”

“Well, I’m changing it back! You should take me to the fight.”

They reach the edge of the parking lot. Shane’s bike—somewhat miraculously—remains locked up around a bent maple tree. Atlanta hoofed it from home. Another two-hour walk awaits her. “What? So you can protect me with your garage sale katana?”

“C’mon. Atlanta. Please. I can be helpful. I can… carry ammo for