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[ic] i'm outta bullets so fuck it, i use my knife
The small noises outside the door were nothing new. Kansas's ears swiveled toward the porch outside only momentarily as he walked past on his way to the living room. He'd woken up late, which wasn't exactly unusual for him. But he figured he'd better see if anyone was still inside - he hated the possibility of others considering him completely antisocial.
But everyone was gone. Kansas stretched all fours and turned back toward the door. He was good at opening it with his front paws by now. When he stepped out into the cool early-autumn air, his left paw crushed a single piece of paper. Had someone left it there accidentally? When he looked more closely, however, his own name scrawled across the top caught his eye. More surprising was that the letter was in Phoenix's handwriting.
He read the letter three times. His chest tightened; he felt his eyes sting. The shock of hearing from his father when he presumed him dead rocked him hard. Phoenix was not dead. Nor was Moon. Still, their situation was terrible. And Kansas could do nothing about it, as usual. Frantically, the Sadira child picked the letter up in his jaws and reentered the manor. He took the stairs to his room several at a time.
Kansas hadn't been the "man" of the family. Not even close. He didn't even know what his sisters and mother were up to these days. If they needed him. Despite what he'd told himself he'd never do again, Kansas let himself go completely limp and he wept.