Work Text:
The stifling heat of Death Valley on June 20, 1936, presses down like a physical weight inside Mickey and Donald’s ramshackle cabin. Dust motes dance in the single shaft of light cutting through a cracked window. Mickey paces, worn boots scuffing the warped floorboards, his brow furrowed deep enough to trap sweat.
Beside him, Donald wrings his hat, his feathers ruffled and trembling, a constant, low mutter escaping his beak: "Six months... six months overdue... feathers are gonna fly, I tell ya!" The air hangs thick with the sour tang of desperation.
THUD! THUD! THUD! The door shudders violently under Sheriff Pete’s massive fist.
Donald jumps, eyes wide with panic. "Nobody home!" he squawks, voice cracking high. "Go away! Vacancy!"
Mickey, ever the optimist, even now, scurries forward. He slides open the tiny, rusty peephole cover just as Pete’s fist crashes against the wood again.
"Good mornin’, Sheriff!" Mickey chirps, forcing a bright smile onto his face. Pete’s bloodshot eye glares through the hole.
"Mornin’?" Pete snarls.
His fist, thick as a ham, smashes through the flimsy wood like paper, catching Mickey square on the snout. The little mouse yelps, a sound like a stepped-on toy, and sails backward, landing in a heap beside a rickety table. Pete shoulders the ruined door aside, splinters flying. He looms in the doorway, a mountain of ill-fitting khaki and menace, waving a crumpled eviction notice.
"Out!" he barks, spittle flying. "By sundown! And this junk," he kicks a wobbly chair, "is collateral!" He spots Donald cowering near the pot-bellied stove. "Quackin’ about vacancies, huh?"
Pete grabs Donald by the scruff of his sailor suit, slamming him hard against the hot iron stove. Donald shrieks, a plume of steam rising as his tail feathers sizzle dangerously close to the burner. Pete gives him a final shake before tossing him aside like a rag doll, landing near Mickey.
As Pete’s heavy footsteps fade, dust settling in the wrecked doorway, Mickey scrambles to Donald.
"Gosh, Donnie! Your tail!" he gasps, patting out a tiny, smoking ember on Donald’s feathers.
Donald just moans, rubbing his bruised chest. Wordlessly, they start grabbing their meager belongings – chipped plates, threadbare blankets, Donald’s spare sailor cap. Mickey stuffs clothes into a burlap sack, his movements frantic.
"C’mon, Donnie, hurry!" he urges, voice tight. "Goofy’s bringin’ the ice truck... gotta be gone before Pete comes back with the wagon!"
The cabin, once a shelter, now feels like a trap closing in.