“Don’t worry about Jayjay, Thuy,” said Jil, ignoring her husband. “Jayjay’s down to one Pig session every two weeks. It takes him that long to process all the stuff that Azaroth helps him remember. He’s gotten so smart. I’m proud of him. Come into the cabin and dry off. You’re going to catch a cold and start sniffling like me.”

“That golem shoon’s on his way,” said Craigor, asserting his presence. “And he’s bringing backup. See them, kiqs? Look in the orphidnet: the golem, a crocodile, a pelican, and a pterodactyl.” He messaged the links.

Thuy zoomed in on the ragged, ineluctable forms. The stubby golem shoon was a mile off, sculling toward the Merz Boat. He’d puffed up his body with air so as to float on the surface, and he was using his arms and legs like oars. Further away, but moving faster, was a submerged plastic crocodile beating a long, tapering tail. A pair of sinister flying shoons were just leaving the ExaExa labs in San Francisco, one resembling a pale green pelican, the other a leathery reddish pterodactyl. “Maybe your boat should swim down to the South Bay?” Thuy said to Craigor.

“No use,” said Craigor. “It’s like when a Frankenstein monster is chasing you in a dream: he moves slow, but he never stops, and eventually you have to rest, and that’s when he catches up.” Reflexively clowning, Craigor lurched stiff-legged toward the stern, rocking from side to side, intoning, “Me kill bad shoons. Jayjay help.”

“I’m staying with Thuy,” said Jayjay, not budging from her side.

Craigor’s voice returned to normal. “If we’re not ready for those attack shoons, kiq, there’s gonna be no romance possibilities for you nohow. Not with Thuy and not with my wife.”

“Don’t always bring that up,” said Jayjay testily. “You should be nicer to Jil.”

“Fuck you. You gonna help or not?”

“All right,” said Jayjay. “Give us a freakin’ minute.” He hugged Thuy again, and this time she let him kiss her.

“You feel so good,” Thuy messaged privately. “Why didn’t you call?”

“I missed you a lot,” messaged back Jayjay. “But I didn’t want to bug you till I’d done something to make you proud. And now I’ve invented my own teleportation technique. It’s much hipper than the Armory-to-ExaExa kludge that Luty set up with those gratings. Prav Plato says I should publish my work as a physics paper, but I’m thinking I should keep the details secret and get rich by selling onetime access links.”

“Rich would be nice,” messaged Thuy. “That way you can get a good place to live. And then maybe we—” But she didn’t dare formulate her wish, not with Jil and Craigor around.