and left, down the gangway. Into the submarine squidlight of the garage’s broad shallow arches, receding down a line of vehicles. Sensing his movement, living tissue coating the arch directly above him brightened. He looked back, and up, at the vehicle’s bulging flank. Ossian was watching, from an observation bay, smugly.
As he walked to the distant elevator, past one vehicle after another, light followed him, the skin of one arch dimming as the next fluoresced.
15.
ANYTHING NICE
L eon, the Halloween before, carved a pumpkin to look like President Gonzales. Flynne hadn’t thought it looked like her, but that it wasn’t racist either, so she left it out on the porch. Second day it was out there, she saw something had nibbled the inside of it, and pooped in it a little. She figured either a rat or a squirrel. Meant to take it around to the garden compost then, but forgot, and next day she found the president’s face caved in, pumpkin flesh behind it all eaten away, leaving the orange skin sagging, wrinkled. Plus there was fresh poop inside. She got the rubber gloves she wore for plumbing chores and carried it out back to the compost, where the wrinkled orange face gradually got uglier until it was gone.
She wasn’t thinking of that as she hung in the cradle of the gyros, watching the gray thing breathe.
It wasn’t gray now, but bronze-black. It had made itself straight, flat, with sharp right angles, but everything else on the face of the fifty-seventh floor, those flat squares and rectangles, was misted, sweating, running with condensation. The thing was perfectly dry, standing out a hand’s breadth from the surface behind it. The twisty legs had become brackets. Centered above the floor of the fold-out balcony directly beneath her.
It was breathing.
Sweat broke from her hairline, in the hot dark of the trailer. She wiped it with the back of her forearm, but some ran into her eyes, stung.
She nudged the copter closer. Saw the thing bulge, then flatten.
She had only a vague idea of what she was flying. A quadcopter, but were the four rotors caged, or exposed? If she’d seen herself reflected in a window, she’d know, but she hadn’t. She wanted to get closer, see if she could trigger an image, the way proximity had done when she’d dropped on that bug. But if her rotors were exposed, and she touched the thing with one, she’d go down.
It swelled again, along a central vertical line, paler than the rest.
Below her, they were at the railing, the woman’s hands on the rod along the top, the man behind her, close, maybe holding her waist.
It flattened. She nudged herself a little closer.
It opened, narrowly, along that vertical line, paler edges curling slightly back, and something small arced out, vanishing. Something scored the forward-cam then, a fuzzy gray comma. Again. Like a gnat with a microscopic chainsaw, or a diamond scribe. Three, four more scratches, insect-quick, flicking like a scorpion’s tail. Trying to blind her.
She pulled herself back, fast, then up, whatever it was still slashing at her forward-cam. Found the pull-down and dead-dropped, tumbling three floors before she let the gyros catch and cup her.
It seemed to be gone. Cam damaged but still functional.
Fast, left.
Up, fast. Passing fifty-six, with the cam on her right she saw him take the woman’s hands, place them over her eyes. From fifty-seven, she saw him kiss her ear, say something. Surprise, she imagined him saying, as she saw him step back, turn.
“No,” she said, as the thing split open. A blur, around the slit. More of them. He glanced up, found it there. Expecting it. Never paused, never looked back. He was about to step back inside.
She went for his head.
She was half up out of the chair, as he saw the copter, ducked, catching himself on his hands.
He must have made a sound then, the woman turning, lowering her hands, opening her mouth. Something flew into her mouth. She froze. Like seeing Burton
As he walked to the distant elevator, past one vehicle after another, light followed him, the skin of one arch dimming as the next fluoresced.
15.
ANYTHING NICE
L eon, the Halloween before, carved a pumpkin to look like President Gonzales. Flynne hadn’t thought it looked like her, but that it wasn’t racist either, so she left it out on the porch. Second day it was out there, she saw something had nibbled the inside of it, and pooped in it a little. She figured either a rat or a squirrel. Meant to take it around to the garden compost then, but forgot, and next day she found the president’s face caved in, pumpkin flesh behind it all eaten away, leaving the orange skin sagging, wrinkled. Plus there was fresh poop inside. She got the rubber gloves she wore for plumbing chores and carried it out back to the compost, where the wrinkled orange face gradually got uglier until it was gone.
She wasn’t thinking of that as she hung in the cradle of the gyros, watching the gray thing breathe.
It wasn’t gray now, but bronze-black. It had made itself straight, flat, with sharp right angles, but everything else on the face of the fifty-seventh floor, those flat squares and rectangles, was misted, sweating, running with condensation. The thing was perfectly dry, standing out a hand’s breadth from the surface behind it. The twisty legs had become brackets. Centered above the floor of the fold-out balcony directly beneath her.
It was breathing.
Sweat broke from her hairline, in the hot dark of the trailer. She wiped it with the back of her forearm, but some ran into her eyes, stung.
She nudged the copter closer. Saw the thing bulge, then flatten.
She had only a vague idea of what she was flying. A quadcopter, but were the four rotors caged, or exposed? If she’d seen herself reflected in a window, she’d know, but she hadn’t. She wanted to get closer, see if she could trigger an image, the way proximity had done when she’d dropped on that bug. But if her rotors were exposed, and she touched the thing with one, she’d go down.
It swelled again, along a central vertical line, paler than the rest.
Below her, they were at the railing, the woman’s hands on the rod along the top, the man behind her, close, maybe holding her waist.
It flattened. She nudged herself a little closer.
It opened, narrowly, along that vertical line, paler edges curling slightly back, and something small arced out, vanishing. Something scored the forward-cam then, a fuzzy gray comma. Again. Like a gnat with a microscopic chainsaw, or a diamond scribe. Three, four more scratches, insect-quick, flicking like a scorpion’s tail. Trying to blind her.
She pulled herself back, fast, then up, whatever it was still slashing at her forward-cam. Found the pull-down and dead-dropped, tumbling three floors before she let the gyros catch and cup her.
It seemed to be gone. Cam damaged but still functional.
Fast, left.
Up, fast. Passing fifty-six, with the cam on her right she saw him take the woman’s hands, place them over her eyes. From fifty-seven, she saw him kiss her ear, say something. Surprise, she imagined him saying, as she saw him step back, turn.
“No,” she said, as the thing split open. A blur, around the slit. More of them. He glanced up, found it there. Expecting it. Never paused, never looked back. He was about to step back inside.
She went for his head.
She was half up out of the chair, as he saw the copter, ducked, catching himself on his hands.
He must have made a sound then, the woman turning, lowering her hands, opening her mouth. Something flew into her mouth. She froze. Like seeing Burton
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