For a sub-tropical country, it sure rained a lot. But wait, didn't sub-tropical and tropical areas have something like a monsoon or something? Perhaps that was it? And if this country had a monsoon season, and this was it, then there was not that much to complain about, really. It could be so much worse. Maybe just the northern part had the real bad monsoons? The news and the weather forecasts were repeatedly warning about flooding in the northern regions.
Such were the random thoughts going through the mind of Michelle Frelang, the pastel yellow mouse woman who was better known as Missy, as she did her work in the garage she had inherited and made her own. It had been a couple of years now since she had emigrated to Minnaluna because of that weird-ass freak inheritance, and in some ways she was still getting used to the weather. But at least there was no snow, with drifts that grew to above her four feet and eight inches of height; that was something she very much did not miss about Wisconsin. And truth be told, the rain was actually a pretty nice rhythmic background sound while she did her work - even when she was shooting footage for her Youtube channel.
Currently, though, she was just doing maintenance. Changing oil and filters on the yellow 1977 Ford F350, the 2008 Dodge rollback truck, the 1964 Dodge D-500 dump truck and the 1950 REO M35 truck, and a set of new contact points and sparkplugs for the M35 truck, as the upgrades to the engine she had done caused it to chew through the original points and plugs. Stupid; she should have thought of that two years ago when she did those upgrades. It was just that that specific truck saw so little use, problems like that remained hidden for quite a while. At least it was getting solved now.
Calmly humming along with the radio while standing on the aluminium ladder that folded into a scaffold and leaning into the engine bay of the M35 truck, the pastel yellow mousette's large round ears perked and swiveled to a sound breaking through the continuous light rumble of the rain on the roof and the solar panels. The unmistakable sound of a quite heavy engine pulling into the forecourt of the garage. Well now, what would it be this time?
Getting upright and hopping off the small aluminium ladder, Missy wiped her fingers on a rag while she walked to the leftmost regular door and opened it to look outside. Sure enough, a vehicle was pulling into the forecourt; a tow truck of Hoik'It, one of the South Plains private towing companies. And it was towing what was without a doubt an early 1970's Chevrolet Chevelle coupe which had once been a deep maroon-ish color but which was now faded and sun-baked to a sickly dull brown-ish color mixed with swaths of surface rust and almost-white primer - and it had some very peculiar damage in the front. Almost as if a cannonball had been fired at it head-on.
As the tow truck came to a stop, Missy walked over to it and raised a paw in greeting at the two man exiting the truck; a brownish red squirrel man dressed in an almost luminous orange pair of overalls with a matching baseball cap from the driver's side, and an ocelot man in gray slacks and a black Vice Grip Garage hoodie from the passenger's side.
"Good afternoon, gentlemen," she smiled, shaking paws with the squirrel man who had been at her garage several times before. "Some weather to be called out in, William, huh?" She also shook paws with the ocelot man. "Rain got to you?"
"You could say that," the ocelot man nodded. "The rain, a deer, and the warning for the deer out on the Minna Forest Road." He also shook Missy's paw. "Patrick Stewardson, pleased."
"Michelle Frelang, nice to meet you. And a deer did this?" Missy said as she stepped to the front of the Chevelle and leaned over a bit to look at the damage. "That must have been one heck of a strong and small deer."
The damage to the front of the old car was indeed rather unusual. The front bumper as well as both the upper and lower valance panels were almost folded double and pushed deep into the engine compartment, along with the radiator core support, which was folded inwards so severely it pulled both front fenders inwards so the headlights looked at each other in a cross-eyed fashion. Fluid was still dripping from the radiator which was pushed back hard as well, with a large section of the lower fins completely ripped out in the middle, and further upwards where it had smashed into the fan which was also crumpled. Several of the steering components were bent inwards, as was the front swaybar, and a long tear went through the bottom of the oil pan, from which drops of black oil still leaked down.
Standing back upright again, Missy looked at the ocelot man who had been looking at her assessing the damage.
"Wow, I have seen some damage in my time, but this is impressive. What did you even do?"
The feline man let go a light chuckle.
"Wouldn't you know, I have something new again. Anyway, what happened is this. What you're looking at here is my throw-around car; it's a project I picked up six or seven years ago from someone who had dropped a different engine in it and then lost steam to finish the rest. I got it running and driving, and I've just been using it to play with a bit, because it's such a fun car to throw around on the B-roads around here. Even, and I daresay especially, in weather like this, so, well, that's what I was doing today." He shrugged with a mild grin. "Going past the south border of the Minna Forest, there's a relatively new sign warning of crossing wildlife at the side of the road. A deer darted out of the forest in front of me, and as I evaded, I found where the old sign used to be, and I found that it was anchored into the ground very solidly. So solidly that when someone hit it years ago, the post snapped, so they planted a new sign. But about three feet of that old post was still sticking up out of the ground, hidden by the tall grass, and that's what I hit at about seventy miles per hour." He let go another light chuckle. "I think I may have flattened it now, though."
"Okay, yeah, that makes a lot of sense," Missy nodded, glancing the damage again. "But wow, that post must have really been anchored super solidly if it did that amount of damage."
"The South Plains city council doesn't mess around when they plant warning signs," the squirrel driver of the tow truck chuckled.
"No kidding," Missy nodded. "I mean, heckity, if that post had been more solid and a bunch longer, you'd have split this car in half."
"Guess I'm lucky there was only three feet of it left," the ocelot man chuckled. "But anyway, I'm thinking this will be a turning point. See, my wife hates this car, she thinks it's ugly as hell and she's been nagging me to get rid of it for about four years now. I know this car isn't worth much, so what I want to know is, can this be fixed, and how much would that cost? Because that will decide whether I keep this car or placate my wife."
Missy let go a soft chortle.
"Let's have a look-see." She stepped in between the tow truck and the Chevelle again and leaned over. "Obviously, you're gonna need a new bumper and a new upper and lower valance and front grille, and a new radiator as well as a new oil pan. That core support might be salvageable, but it's probably better to have it replaced. Fortunately the hood popped open, so that's okay, and those fenders can be straightened back out without too much effort. What else... new fan, this one is beyond saving. The swaybar could be straightened back out, but the center link is so bent it's gonna have to be replaced, and maybe the tie rods as well." She wiggled a finger into the tear in the oil pan. "Hmm, that bit of post ripped off the oil pickup and it bent the pickup tube, so that's gonna have to be replaced as well. Some new hoses and belts will be in order, and maybe the water pump is tweaked, but I can't really tell at the moment, that will need some testing. How long has this motor been running after that bit of post ripped through the oil pan and dumped out all the oil?"
"Couple of minutes, I shut it off when I came to a stop inches away from one of those huge trees," the ocelot man said. "It was still running okay at that point, but it did not sound too happy."
"Right, yeah, there might be some internal damage," Missy nodded. "Spun bearings probably, but either way this motor will need to be gone through."
"Yeah, I was kinda afraid of that," the ocelot man nodded. "So what are we looking at for costs?"
Missy wiped her fingers with the rag again.
"It'll depend on the route you want to go. All these parts are rather easily available, and you can get all the parts that need replacing from just about any junkyard for five, six, seven hundred bucks. You can also order them new, but then you'll be looking at three, three and a half grand. And you can do all the work yourself, you did mention it's your project car, and in that case all it will cost you is several weekends of work. However, if you want a garage to do it, you'll be looking at..." She leaned over to look under the severely folded front bumper again and shrugged as she stood back upright. "I'd say, based on my own qualities and experience, three, maybe four work days of labour, so that would be twenty-four to thirty-two hours, at anywhere between sixty to eighty-seven dollars an hour, which would add another two to three grand. And then I'm not even counting the pulling and disassembling of the engine to check it for damage, and fixing whatever damage may be there; that's another two days at least. And to be totally honest, this is not a six grand car. Twelve hundred at most the way it's sitting here now, and likely less than that if the motor is damaged from the oil starvation."
"Ouch, my wallet," the ocelot man chuckled. "Yeah, I was kinda thinking it would go that direction the moment I looked under the car to see what had happened. And seeing as how I picked this car up for a thousand back then, it's not worth those repair costs to me." He shrugged with a light grin. "Well, that just leaves me with one question; do you want the car? If yes, I'll ask this fellow to unhook it here. If no, I'll ask him to pull it over to Bowen Salvage and unhook it there."
Missy chortled softly while stepping around the car and running a paw over the body panels.
"With how straight the rest of this body is, if you bring it to Bowen Salvage, Fenlo will call me five minutes after you've left to tell me about this great car that was just brought into his yard and either give it to me or sell it to me for a couple hundred bucks. And I do see potential here for an engaging video series on my channel, so we'd best cut out Fenlo as the middle man and save you and William here an extra trip to the other side of South Plains. I'll take it. Matter of fact, I'll be fair and pay you the grand you paid for it when you first bought it."
"That's more than I could even ask for, and you've just made my wife a very happy woman," the ocelot man chuckled, turning to the squirrel tow truck driver. "Well, I guess you can put her down here."
"Not so fast," Missy chortled. She stepped over to the front of the yard and pointed at the second lot a couple dozen yards down the road. "Go over to the next entrance there and set it down in front of that small yellow workshop over there, please. All my bays here are currently full, and as this will be a personal project, I won't have it take up customer space." She looked at the ocelot man again. "And have you taken all your personal possessions out of it?"
"You got it, Missy," the squirrel man nodded, and the ocelot man gave a light shrug. "All my personal possessions are on my person, there's nothing in that car but an owner's manual and some receipts and spare parts. Mind if I wait here for my wife? I'll give her a call to come pick me up and bring the title and registration of that car."
"Of course, I'll even give you a towel and a cool drink," Missy nodded with a chortle.
She led the way into the garage building for the ocelot man, while the squirrel man got back behind the wheel of the tow truck to pull the wrecked Chevelle over to the neighboring yard. Provided with a towel and a drink from the Mountain Dew display refrigerator, the ocelot man gave Missy his information so the vanilla-hued mousette could transfer a payment to his account for the car and climbed the stairs to the mezzanine over the toilet and office to sit down and call his wife. Missy also handed the squirrel man a towel and a cool drink when he returned and walked into the garage building to get the ocelot man's details, thanking Missy and wishing her good luck with the wrecked car.
Less than an hour later, a white 2015 Volvo S80 pulled into the garage forecourt, letting out the ocelot man's wife, a chocolate-point Siamese cat woman. She gave Missy the paperwork to the car as well as her profound gratitude for taking ownership of the car so she no longer would have to be bothered by it. While they drove away to go back home, Missy put the keys to the Chevelle in the cabinet filled with rows of little hooks and filed away the paperwork, then took some time to put together a list of bullet points for what the car needed and what she wanted to do with it for an entertaining new video series.
All the while, the vanilla-colored mousette couldn't stop chortling softly to herself from time to time. Man, those warning signs could be darn dangerous!
