Chapter 3, part 1: In Which Our Hero Traumatizes His Kidneys

(Z: I challenge you to claim with a straight face that this building doesn't make you kind of maybe like rabbitholes at least a little bit.)

It wasn't long before Altin got the call from Oxendine. She always did manage to get the job done like that. Oxy didn't bring the greatest news, though. "Look, you're in, but like I said, it's real low-level stuff. They'll let you try your hand at being the decoy on a couple of their smaller jobs, that's all. And they only agreed to that because there isn't much of a chance for you to blow it, so count yourself lucky and keep your head down."

At least it was paying, that was the important thing. Without any work for so long, Altin had become an accidental vegetarian, surviving off his little garden while--

That was it! This was where he drew the line! Spot would not turn Bolt into another demon beast in horse form that would follow him around every time he stepped foot outside, waiting to strike. He was going to march over to that zebra right now and remind her which of them was the horse and which was the sim! In fact, by the end of the day, she was going to let him ride her, and this time it wouldn't wind up with him getting thrown to the ground in some distant town!

Altin could bribe her with carrots, right? Horses love carrots!

It was at that point that Altin discovered that while horses might love carrots, zebras preferred the taste of human flesh. If he was going to have to work this hard to get a bridle on Spot every time he wanted to ride her, he'd be in trouble. He only had so many fingers, after all.

(Z: Also, I've learned that caught-in-a-net thought bubble is EA's way of telling Altin "It's a trap!")

Tacking up completed, with more than its fair share of blood, sweat, and tears (mostly blood), now came the easy part. Altin just had to jump up onto her back like he did at the zoo, and everything would work out fine. 

He was beginning to expect that Spot only liked having him around when she needed zoo fences cut.

But Altin was determined, and he was fed up, and he was lucky, so he was pretty sure she wouldn't succeed at outright killing him. Minor limb damage, maybe, but the Grim Reaper could content himself with miscellaneous stray dogs today. He hoped.

Oh, that's not a good thought bubble...

...ouch.

Well, that was undignified. 

Altin pulled himself to his feet and brushed off the giant dirt-colored hoofprint on his shirt -- although the considerably more bruise-colored one underneath his shirt would be sticking around for a while -- and reassessed the situation. Maybe if he...

Oh, come on.

...no, that wouldn't work either.

They continued in this vein through most of the afternoon, with Altin spending more of the day laying on the ground than standing on it, and Spot showing him the handy trick she learned of twisting herself out of the tack and making Altin start all over again. He didn't dare take the chance to break for dinner (although Spot did), because he was afraid he wouldn't have the willpower to go back to getting kicked in the gut on a full stomach.

She was pretty keen on recycling.

(Z: Continued.)