Do?
We can’t just sit here, can we? Let’s just drive around. Find some trouble.
But.
Your turn to drive though.
Drive? I don’t really —
But Starx, weirdly quick, had already circled the car, opened Olpert’s door, and now waited there massively on the sidewalk while a sax solo wailed from the speakers.
Though there wasn’t much traffic due to the holiday, navigating downtown’s one-ways, plus his hangover, plus his natural anxiety behind the wheel, plus Starx’s music, plus Starx with his seat slid into the backseat, thumping the dashboard, howling, Drag you down, drag you down, drag you mutherfuggin down, caused Olpert’s grip on the steering wheel to tighten into white-knuckled panic. As he turned onto Paper Street, the song climaxed in a commotion of cymbal crashes and throaty howling.
Olpert cracked his window.
What are you doing.
It’s, Olpert yelled, it’s just a little loud. The music, I mean.
It’s freezing out.
I don’t drive very often. I’m, Starx — I’m finding it hard to concentrate.
Not a Cysterz fan, I guess. Starx snapped the radio off. Better, princess?
Olpert pulled to a stop at Lakeside Drive. He turned, hand over hand, toward Bay Junction and the southern edge of People Park, while Starx played with the powerlocks: chunk, chunk. Chunk, chunk.
A barricade blocked the roundabout’s exit to Parkside West, two Helpers sat in lawnchairs arm wrestling atop a cooler. Olpert leaned out, displayed his khaki, was waved through onto the empty street.
Where are you going? said Starx.
You said just drive around!
By the park? What if the HG’s see us, figure we’re shirking duties? Think, Bailie!
Down the slope Crocker Pond shimmered in the sunlight. Spectators, already numbering in the hundreds, filled the common.
Hey, said Starx, I need to express myself. Pull over.
What?
Urinate.
Here?
Yeah here, I’ll go in the trees. Nothing quite like urinating in the open air.
Can’t you wait?
Bailie, what the fug, mine’s not your average flow. Starx clawed across the frontseat, grabbed the wheel, and yanked the Citywagon over two lanes toward the curb.
A thump — something smacked the windshield, something white and sudden from above. Instead of braking Olpert stomped the gas, the car shot under the Yellowline tracks, veered into the Citywagon lot, and with a succession of explosive highfives, tore the sideview mirrors from a row of vehicles parked along the median.
Bailie, whoa, what are you doing?
We hit a bird, moaned Olpert, we killed a bird.
Brake! Fuggin Bailie, brake!
I’m braking, I’m braking.
The car slowed, Olpert signalled, checked his blindspot, pulled over, stopped.
We hit a bird, said Olpert.
Yeah, I saw that. Quite a performance, Bailie.
The bird, he said, do you think it’s dead?
Starx got out of the car. Olpert trembled, tried to steady his breathing. The walkie-talkie crackled and Griggs, in a typically listless monotone, droned, Silentium. Logica. Securitatem — and before Prudentia Olpert clicked the thing off. In the rearview he watched Starx survey the debris, shake his head, move south.
Oh man, Bailie, he called. You gotta come see this.
Olpert joined him: at the end of a trail of shattered glass and plastic, lying in a heap of feathers against the curb, was a dove.
Oh no. It isn’t.
Fuggin right it is.
No.
Have you ever seen any other doves in this city? In the wild?
It’s not a pigeon?
What, an albino? Come on, Bailie. You know exactly what and whose that thing is.
I didn’t — I didn’t even see it, it came out of nowhere.
At the end of the street, the two Helpers had their hands raised in identical exaggerated shrugs — like, What the fug?
Starx waved. Nothing to see here! Back to work!
Hey, don’t! What if they come look? What are we going to do?
Whoa. Hold on. We? This was all you, pencildick.
Me?
Yeah you. I wasn’t the one driving.
That’s — that’s not fair. You grabbed the wheel!
Which reminds me, said Starx, and he headed off into the bushes, unzipping.
Olpert crouched beside the dead bird. One wing was folded, the other splayed, the head tucked into its chest, the tiny gnarled treeroots of its claws. No blood. Though Olpert imagined the damage was internal, its organs pulverized to stew. Dead, dead, dead — and he had killed it.
Starx returned. He nudged the dove with his shoe. Then, in a single, swift movement, he scooped the little corpse under his toe, lifted it up, and launched it into the bushes.
There.
That’s where you peed!
Bailie. It’s dead.
Olpert stood. Still, some respect. .
Respect? Starx grabbed Olpert by the shoulders. Listen, you were driving, the bird should’ve been smart enough not to fly into traffic. Maybe that magician dopes his birds. Maybe he abuses them and they get suicidal. Whatever, it’s not your fault. The guy lets these things loose in the city? You figure he figures he’ll lose a couple. Partner, am I right?
Yes, but —
Hey hey hey. No buts. This is not a big deal. Dead bird? Who cares. A million of those things die every day crashing into skyscrapers.
Really?
Probably. Listen, why don’t I drive the rest of the day?
Will you?
Starx put his arm around Olpert and walked him back to their car, sweeping the broken sideview mirrors under the parked Citywagons as they went.
Sliding the driver’s seat back Starx said, Those Helpers won’t sell us out. Don’t worry.
Are they friends of yours?
Not really. . but silentium, right? It’s the first fuggin pillar.
Olpert looked over his shoulder: past the line of Citywagons, silver and symmetrical and identical, the two Helpers were taking turns putting each other in grappling holds.
And hey, Bailie, said Starx, what about that chick last night.
Debbie?
Yeah, that’s the one. Before your. . upset, I thought she seemed into you.
You think?
Sure. Just, next time? See if you can chat her up without puke-painting your khaki.
You really think she was into me?
You bet. Now let’s get out of here before that bird’s pals show up for vengeance.
POP LEANED IN and on a gust of eggy breath said, Lark! Birds.
A half-dozen pigeons had made their way to the foot of the sculpture. Get those stupid things out of here, Loopy told her assistant. The girl looked at Loopy, then the birds, and with a sigh tiptoed over flapping her arms. They scuttled around behind the sculpture, more aggravated than scared. The assistant followed at a crouch, clapping, and the pigeons hopped along, circled the sculpture’s base, and the assistant gently shooed them around again, around and around. Debbie watched with interest.
At the next pass Loopy went hurtling at the pigeons with the wings of her caftan spread wide, cawing and shrieking, and the flock ruffled up and came to rest on the lip of the fountain, cooing and cool. Returning to her spot by the covered sculpture, Loopy didn’t take her eyes off the pigeons, ready to pounce at the slightest provocation.
At last the Mayor arrived, wheeled by Diamond-Wood, who clattered behind on his crutches. Stop, she called, with a wary scan of the cobblestones. We’ll be fine here.
Those who had heard tell of Raven’s bisection gawked. Debbie wasn’t sure what she was seeing: a white sheet draped over the dessert cart gave the impression of an enormously wide-waisted skirt supported by a trestle the size of a writing desk.