I know. You’re thinking: why should I believe this guy when he has received two Desuetude Warnings in the last eight weeks? Why should I listen to someone who has been downgraded from solo to partner to backup? Why should I put any faith whatsoever in the opinion of a pulse who has set a Janus record for permeability with three hits in the last nine months? Why should it matter to me that old Otto has screwed up so royally that this job, this lousy job pulsing third-class, six-figure tribal artifacts, represents his last chance to improve his standing at Janus and save himself from being sent back out to the colonies?

You should listen because I am an exemplary cautionary tale. I used to be the man. Just look at who I used to be only one year ago, when Pinkerton was still alive, before I became a punch line, before I started finding rattraps in my locker, before the goddamn Rat Burglar—

The cowrie shells and sacrificial pigment stare at me in a menacing way. There’s no fooling a K’plua. You might only be worth mid-six, fella, but you’re sharp. You know I’m stalling, don’t you? All right, all right, all right already. The hard part is over. I’ve said what I had to say about being a pulse. Now down to business.

I pull the ring out of my pocket and get down on one knee.⁶ A false alarm would pretty much guarantee demotion, but when I propose I’m going to be nervous⁷ so I need to simulate that as closely as possible if I am going to get it right. So I risk it. I lean in so close to the glass that my breath fogs it up and I can see the proximity cloud glowing red.

“Charlie,” I say out loud. “Charlita. Charlita Sophia Izzo. Will, ah, you . . .”

What I hear next makes me jump. I go sprawling backwards and my legs kick the shelving that supports the mask. It’s a seriousimpact. For a moment I can’t tell if the mask has moved. I brace myself for the squeal of the alarm, but it doesn’t come. When I recover—I am so lucky—I turn around, and there he is, the last guy in the world I want to see.

Schermer.

Make That Four

I don’t know what I did to make this guy hate me. Maybe it’s because I always outpoint him on our comps. Or because I’m the one with the signature busts.⁸ I think maybe there is some class hatred going on, too; Schermer comes from a long line of distinguished pulses and has the pedigree, but I’m the one with the gift, and—until recently—I’ve been the one getting the prestige gigs. One time when he was being snotty to me after I again posterized him on the tests, I called him Mr. Honorable Mention, which, in fairness, didn’t help make friends.⁹ Whatever the reason, he’s been after me from my very first day at Janus. When the Rat Burglar rolled me the first time (seven figures’ worth of twelfth-century Khmer reliefs from Angkor Wat: ouch) using a heavy dose of Kolokol-9, Schermer filled my locker full of rattraps. I came back from the job, opened my locker, reached in without looking and about a dozen rattraps exploded everywhere. I got two broken fingers and he didn’t let anyone forget it for months.