“You’re a deus ex machina,” Miss Havisham whispers.
“We are not yet,” says Proserpina tightly, “out of the machine.”
They can’t get out the way they came in. Emily-Jane’s already had to break an orderly’s nose; more must be coming soon–
And then, suddenly, Elijah is standing in a delivery door. “Come on,” he says. The world outside is surprisingly sunlit.
“I’m taking her into town,” says Proserpina. “Elijah?”
He nods.
“I have to get back to school,” says Radiane. “Georgette, Euphrania, you can help me cover–”
“I’m going to tell my father,” says Iala, pale and sick and furious.
“I. Need. Amacackas,” says Sebastian patiently.
“What, sweetie?” asks his mother Fern.
“Amacackas!”
She shakes her head. “I just don’t know–”
“I! Need! AaaaaaNGH.”
“Sebastian!” Fern rushes over to him. “What did you do?”
“Borrowed some time from a potential future self, probably,” says Sebastian, and glances down at his diaper. “What am I, here, about two?”
Fern gapes.
“It’s quantum,” says Sebastian, waving his hand. “Don’t worry about it. Okay, is there an emergency?”
“I,” says Fern, “uh. You wanted something? But I didn’t know what.”
Sebastian furrows his little brow.
“I think it’s animal crackers,” he says at length.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
“I demand tea!” Captain Spaceship yells at the computer.
“Actually, Captain, it can’t really interpret voice commands,” says Lieutenant Ethnic politely. “It could, perhaps, but true artificial intelligence and complete servitude are mutually incompati–”
“Enough!” says Captain Spaceship. “What were we doing?”
“We were getting boarded by hostile forces, sir.”
The door opens with a specially recorded hiss. Captain Spaceship spins and fires a raygun hole through Commander Beard, who topples gently, the requested teacup still in his hand.
“That should have been an ensign!” roars Captain Spaceship.
“They abolished the rank of ensign,” sighs Lieutenant Ethnic. “We both know why.”
You have to be in good shape to Magnajoust, of course, but you don’t need the traditional athletic form. Miguel Sebanon (#8) is only 5’4″. He and the other rogue back (Carol Tolliver, #41) derive a distinct advantage from their low centers of gravity.
Gravity, like peripheral vision, matters in Electric Magnajoust. This is why Imani Rhodes (#17) makes them hold flashcards to either side of her as she stares intently straight ahead.
“You look ridiculous,” Stephanie Long informs her.
“I’ve almost got it,” Imani Rhodes insists.
“The previews are starting,” Simon Yu groans.
“Zero!” says Imani Rhodes. “Shit, six?”
Lie isn’t easy for a coboy.
Cly Lonley rides into tow with the tumblewee, hat low over his yes. He ties his hose to the itching pot and jingles into the Ack of Heats Salon; when he pushes through the winging doos, the pinist hits an ugly chod.
“What can I get you, miter?”
Lonley drops ten Moran ollars in a puddle of bee. “Just keep it coming,” he runts.
His togue losens soon enough. “When I’m away from her,” he mumbles, “there’s something missing from the worl.”
The batender just glares, and sucks the finges he burned on a hotglass.
#9430, from the orderly’s sloppy logbook. Proserpina tiptoes to slide open the viewing slot, and inside, Madeleine Havisham twitches back in reflexive fear.
“Ma’am,” she whispers, “it’s us.”
Miss Havisham says nothing–this isn’t her first hallucination, in here–but leans closer.
From down the corridor, Emily-Jane gives a pigeon’s whistle: at school, it would mean a teacher approaching. Radiane’s throat is pounding. “Can we circle back?” she hisses.
The door is double-bolted and bound with steel. Proserpina looks at it, thinking of filmstrips, of her father, of six boards placed in a stack.
She draws back her fist.
Billy blinks and he’s chopping vegetables, nine hours later: his rider has elected to suppress his memory of the evening. His calves and lower back ache, but there’s no sleep-grit in his eyes. Stimulants? Or a nap? He makes a note to run diagnostics.
First things, though. He tosses the carrots and broccoli in the steamer, purées them and takes his rider her dinner.
“You never ask where you’ve been,” she says, eyes bright above her white swaddling. “Doesn’t it bother you, not having free will?”
He puts the straw to her lips. “Why?” he asks. “Does it bother you?”
Lucie Corner’s back the following week, so they throw a receiveoff (or possibly a sendon; signs are unclear) to welcome her. You get traded a lot in Electric Magnajoust if you’re in it for the money.
Imani Rhodes (#17) has never been traded.
“Don’t do it,” Simon Yu tells Stephanie Long, as they lie on the roof with their feet in the window.
“I’m not,” protests Stephanie Long.
“Don’t hook up with Lucie Corner,” says Simon Yu. “She’ll wring you out, Stephanie Long. Stop coming to her parties. I mean it.”
Which shows how much Simon Yu (#0) knows about women.
“He seemed like such a nice young man,” says Mrs. Clenham as they pull another body out of the lime pit. “Quiet, polite, just kept to himself.”
“Which is why we called the police,” says Mr. Clenham.
“I’m not a freaking serial killer!” yells their struggling neighbor as the officers drag him to the car. “I hardly ever went into my back yard! I don’t even have a fence around it!”
“Have you heard the rumors that he removed his victims’ corneas?” says a titillated reporter.
“What a ghastly thing,” says Mrs. Clenham innocently. “I can’t imagine how those would taste.”
“It says here that you’re the sole member of Vampyromorphida,” says Judge Naeus, “and that your species name is infernalis, literally ‘vampire squid from hell.’ Correct?”
Vampire Squid confers with its attorney, who is also a squid (Loligo vulgaris). “Yes, Your Honor.”
“You survive at lightless depths in oxygen concentrations of 3%… you can flip inside out to appear in a frightening, spine-covered form called ‘pumpkin posture…’ I think I’ve seen enough here.” Naeus drops the folder. “I’m sorry, Vampire Squid, but you’re simply too cool to exist. Bailiff?”
Vampire Squid escapes, of course, in a cloud of bioluminescent mucus.