Her new baby sister is the day, the joy, the light.
Nightjar’s seven. Her hair is finally long and glossy, as black as eyes. She has the run of the manor house and its grounds; sometimes, if she takes Gnomon, she’s allowed to walk the road of an afternoon. Not that she has a choice, about Gnomon. Her father spun him out of her shadow.
Gnomon is tall and thin, booted, cloaked and cravatted. He wears small, square pince-nez glasses. He has no mouth or eyes. Nightjar hates him and admires him: she begins wearing a cloak of her own.
Wednesday, November 16, 2005
Bari pours the flat gray discs shyly into Armin’s hands. “I want you to have these,” she says.
Armin picks one up and turns it over. It says COMISSUM on one side, and TRUST on the other.
“Thank you,” he says. “Do you have a dollar?”
Later, as Armin’s new biker friends set her couch on fire, Bari struggles through the party crowd into her kitchen. “This isn’t fair!” she screams over the music. “I want it back now!”
“Ah no, sweetie,” says Armin, crushing another disc to powder and rolling the dollar into a tube. “It doesn’t work like that.”
Friday, November 11, 2005
In the white there is the Word, and the Word is MEIT.
Rob tries to speak the Word and stops. Ah, yes, to say the Word would make it transient; to speak is to debase it. He still his tongue. He stills his breath.
Rob lurches and falls. His vision blurs, then doubles: MEIT and MEIT cross over each other and become something else. Different. Rob understands that this is wrong. He must be rid of it. He must make it transient.
“EMET,” he whispers. Then he’s choking, gagging through the vomit in his nose, struggling with a rough brown blanket.
Thursday, November 10, 2005
The unobtrusive ads in Besnik’s peripheral vision suddenly pop 404s. He blinks twice, trying for a reboot, but then the whole GRail maglev whines down and chunks to a stop. The lights flicker out; battery backups flood the car with red light.
“Someone ping support,” he says. The woman next to him thumps her WiPod and shakes her head.
“Can’t get a signal,” she says. “No connectivity just when the train dies? It’s almost like Google cras–”
“Don’t say it!” hisses Besnik. It’s not real if nobody says it, he thinks, swallowing panic. The impossible can’t be true until it’s named.
Wednesday, November 9, 2005
“They can’t withstand escape or re-entry, obviously,” says Hitomi, striding the catwalk. “We rent a skyhook for that, or a recyclable rocket. But once in the vacuum, they’re excellent for interstation transport, lunar trips…”
Cherise leans over the rail. “I just can’t believe origami’s come this far. Or that the astronauts don’t get papercuts!” She laughs; Hitomi doesn’t.
“Would you joke about missing thumbs in a sausage plant?” she asks coldly.
“No–” sputters Cherise. “Of course not–”
“And we don’t joke about papercuts.” Hitomi points down at the factory floor, where a one-armed foreman is directing a complicated fold.
Tuesday, November 8, 2005
Halfway through her sandwich, Liddy opens her mouth and starts to sing. Her mouth is full; Martha gets sprayed with chicken salad. She wipes her t-shirt and realizes that Liddy’s not singing a song, just holding out one note.
Somebody takes it up behind her. Martha stumbles up and the note populates the lunchyard. It’s starting to hurt her ears, and just then they find whatever note resonates inside cinderblocks, because the wall of the school collapses.
“Holy shit,” whispers Martha. All the singers have stopped. They’re looking the same direction. Their eyes are enormous, and black as piano keys.
“Never thought I’d see you with that haircut,” says Epstein.
“The meds are helping.” Jackie smiles. The coffeehouse is warm and yellow.
“They really did a nummm.” Epstein tries to take back the half-word. “Fixed you up in there, huh?”
“I maintain that everything’s data,” Jackie says quietly. “But I’m better at prioritizing some over others.”
“Not still trying to decode your heartbeat?” Epstein asks. “You’re not doing that thing where somebody says where’s that siren, and you take two steps and–”
“I told you,” says Jackie, “the meds are helping,” and reads the barcode of a passing bicycle’s spokes.
“Oh, man,” says Caraway, “with a name like that you must have gone through–”
Satan smiles. “It’s just the Hebrew for ‘adversary.’ Like being named Buster.”
“Bet you had fun at school,” chuckles Caraway.
Silence.
“Anyway, your application seems fine,” Caraway mutters. “Just looking for seasonal work?”
“With an eye toward the future, if there’s a permanent opening. And if I stay in town.”
“Well, bring me three forms of ID tomorrow, and the job’s yours.”
“Good to hear.” Satan sounds relieved; they stand and shake.
“Welcome to Pet A Bit, Satan,” says Caraway. “I hope you like hickory and piss.”
Thursday, November 3, 2005