Galen Strauss, approaching from the opposite direction, witnessed these events as if through the fat end of a telescope: a distant splash of color and movement, far beyond the range of his vision. If it had been anybody else on Platform Ten that night, someone whose eyesight was more robust, who was not going blind from acute glaucoma as Galen Strauss was, a clearer picture of events might have emerged. As it was, what occurred on Firing Platform Nine would never be known by anyone except those directly involved; and even they did not understand it.

What happened was this:

The Watcher Soo Ramirez, her thoughts still bobbing in the currents of Belle of the Ball and, in particular, a scene set in a moving coach during a thunderstorm so vividly rendered that she could practically recall it word for word (As the heavens opened, Talbot seized Charlene in his powerful arms, his mouth falling on hers with a searing force, his fingers finding the silken curve of her breast, waves of ardor roiling through her ….), turned to see Jimmy hoisting himself onto the platform; and her first impression, punching through her feelings of conflicted irritation (she resented the interruption; he was late) was that something wasn’t right. He doesn’t look like himself, she thought. This isn’t the Jimmy I know. He stood a moment, his body oddly slack, his eyes squinting with perplexity into the lights; he looked like a man who had come to make an announcement, only to have forgotten his lines. Soo thought maybe she knew what this unspoken declaration was—she’d had a feeling for some time that Jimmy considered the two of them as more than friends—and under different circumstances, she might have been glad to hear this from him. But not now. Not tonight, on Firing Platform Nine.

“It’s her eyes,” he said faintly; he seemed to be speaking to himself. “At least I thought it was her eyes.”

Soo stepped toward him. His face was turned away, as if he couldn’t bring himself to look at her. “Jimmy? Whose eyes?”

But he didn’t answer her. One hand reached down to the hem of his jersey and proceeded to tug at it, like a nervous boy fumbling with his clothes. “Can’t you feel it, Soo?”

“Jimmy, what are you talking about?”

He had begun to blink. Fat, jeweled tears were spilling down his cheeks. “They’re all so fucking sad.”

Something was happening to him, Soo knew, something bad. In a burst of motion he yanked his jersey over his head and flung it over the edge of the platform. His chest was glazed with sweat that shone in the lights.

“It’s these clothes,” he growled. “I can’t stand these clothes.”