Arty thinks this car is probably supposed to be like, fun or whatever, but to her it just feels like a mean joke. Obstacle course? Cops and robbers? They were fighting for their lives for real just a little while ago… and now they’re playing a playground game. She’s fed up with it before it even starts.
Actually, the precise moment she decides she’s fed up with it is when she sees who’s in which uniform. Not for one moment does Arty think these team assignments were randomized. It feels too targeted. Another part of the joke. Like, couldn’t Arty be in the power position just once in her entire life? But no, she’s pigeonholed as one of the bad guys while people like Viper and Jack run around (speed around?), no doubt abusing their unearned power. But okay!
Needless to say, as soon as she’s out of range of Plart, Arty takes off her ski mask and flings it in the mall trash can. She may be forced to play this game if she doesn’t want to stay in this car forever (and why would she), but she doesn’t have to look like a cartoon villain while she does it.
And yeah, in normal circumstances, Arty wouldn’t see much of a problem with stealing. But something about being expected to do it chafes her, and so she doesn’t. For a while she just circles the mall, steering clear of everyone else and stewing in the injustice of her situation (while attempting to perfect her segway driving technique, because true girlbosses multitask). But she happens to be driving past the food court when she hears someone call her name.
Her first instinct is to book it—kind of forgetting that she doesn’t have any stolen merchandise she can be caught with in the first place—but thankfully the one calling her is a fellow ‘criminal.’ Unthankfully, it is Dexter, whom Arty has finally formed an opinion of, and it is negative. Looks like she’s finally noticed him taking pictures of dead and/or mauled bodies.
That said. Arty is extremely hungry. She hasn’t had meat since half her meatballs were nicked off her plate in the furniture car and the other half she’d smuggled lost in a shipwreck. God, she can smell the lamb from here… and she can put off stealing something for a while longer.
Arty cautiously approaches, still on wheels for the time being. She squints at him like she suspects he has an ulterior motive. “Why are you sharing? You could just eat that yourself.”
